MEPs highlight Romanian children’s rights abuses

From the Irish News..................

21/05/2006 - 11:23:27

The European Parliament is coming under fire for failing to focus on children’s rights abuses in Romania during accession talks.

A number of MEPs say Romania should have been instructed to improve the plight of the 36,000 institutionalised children as a condition of joining the EU.

A recent report by Mental Disability Rights International revealed many of these children are kept in cages.

Fianna Fáil MEP Brian Crowley says Romania should also be told to lift its 2005 ban on international adoption.

He said: “Obviously it would be better if Romanian parents could adopt Romanian children, but children are being given up by their families without foster care being available for them and without other adoptive parents in Romania for them."

"Some of these children,” he added, “have mental and physical disabilities, who people don’t want to touch.”