By Aaron Ross
KINSHASA, Feb 22 (Reuters) - Democratic Republic of Congo
will allow some 150 children adopted by foreign parents, mostly
Americans, to leave the country after spending more than two
years in legal limbo, the interior ministry said on Monday.
In 2013, Congo imposed a moratorium on exit visas to
children adopted by foreign parents, citing fears that the
children could be abused or trafficked. The government has also
voiced concerns about adoptions by gay couples.
Congo became a favoured international adoption destination
in recent years because it has more than 4 million orphaned
children, according to the U.N. children's agency UNICEF, as
well as lax regulation.
The central African nation is mineral-rich but deeply
impoverished. It has suffered through two civil wars and armed
groups continue to plague its eastern region.
Between 2010 and 2013, U.S. adoptions from Congo rose 645
percent, the U.S. Department of State said.
Interior ministry spokesman Claude Pero Luwara said an
inter-ministerial commission had approved the exit visas. In
November, the commission signed off on exit visas for about 70
children adopted by European, Canadian and American families.
Congo's government has come under intense pressure from
those countries' governments to lift the suspension.
"The dossiers that were released ... it was mostly American
children," Luwara said, adding that the commission will consider
about 900 more foreign adoption cases and plans to complete its
work next month.
Parliament is expected to take up a bill this year to lift
the moratorium and regulate foreign adoptions.
The U.S. Embassy in the capital Kinshasa could not
immediately confirm the interior ministry's statement.
A Thomson Reuters Foundation investigation in October found
that the ban had spurred a black market in child smuggling, with
more than 80 adopted Congolese children illegally transported
out of the country and to the United States. by Matthew Mpoke Bigg and Katharine Houreld)