Guatemala adoption home 'legal'

US couples adopted more than 4,000 Guatemalan children last year

The owner of a children's home under investigation by Guatemalan authorities has rejected claims it was operating illegally as an adoption centre.

Police raided the home near Guatemala City on Saturday, amid concerns the babies might have been taken from their parents for illegal adoption abroad.

Clifford Phillips, a US citizen who owns the home with his Guatemalan wife, said he was "shocked" by the raid.

The home had been officially approved for adoptions since 1994, he said.

Officials have said few of the children had the necessary paperwork to be in the custody of anyone other than their parents, and that the house did not have permission to operate as an adoption centre.

However, the Guatemalan attorney general's office said on Monday there was so far no evidence that the children had been stolen or their parents coerced into giving them up.

Officials have been checking the status of the 45 children, aged from a few days to three years old, and have said they will place them in shelters.

Two lawyers who reportedly processed the adoptions were detained during the police raid.

'Legal and transparent'

In a statement, Mr Phillips defended the operations of the Casa Quivira home, based in the tourist town of Antigua.

It is very difficult, the uncertainty and not knowing what is going to happen next to the children - our kids Katherine Prospective adoptive parent US mother defends adoption

He said the centre operated under government-approved statutes, had all the necessary paperwork and worked hard to process adoptions legally and transparently while caring for the children.

"We believe that our adoptions are conducted in a way that positively supports the people of Guatemala," Mr Phillips said.

"We will continue to do our best to make sure that the children are well cared for and that their adoptions can be completed with as little delay as possible."

Birth mothers are given several opportunities to change their minds about giving up their child for adoption, he said, and two DNA tests are carried out to ensure each woman is the birth mother of the infant concerned.

The mothers are also interviewed through the Guatemalan Family Court, he added.

Katherine, a US citizen from Michigan who is in the process of adopting twin boys from Casa Quivira, told the BBC News website she feared the authorities' plan to move the children out of the home "could have dire consequences for their health and safety".

Problems 'overstated'

Last year, couples in the US adopted more than 4,000 infants from Guatemala, second only to China.

Earlier this year, the Guatemalan Congress ratified The Hague Convention on Inter-country Adoptions which sets out a series of measures guaranteeing greater transparency in the process of adoption.

However, the US state department is advising against the practice because of reports that many Guatemalan mothers face pressure to sell their children into adoption.

Last week, the US embassy in Guatemala tightened up the visa regulations for couples trying to adopt there.

Lisa, an American who adopted a daughter from Guatemala last year, told the BBC that media reports citing corruption were not backed up by her own experience or that of other adoptive parents she had met.

She went through an agency that was very "reliable, honest and moral", she said, and had been confident that the lawyers were acting ethically.

While Guatemala's system was not perfect, negative media reports and anecdotal stories of mothers being forced to give up their children overstated the problems, she said.

'Rumours'

Guatemala-based journalist Martin Asturias told the BBC that adoption had become big business in the country.

Costs range from about $25,000 (£12,500) to about $60,000 (£30,000) depending on how complicated the process was and how specific the adoptive parents were in their demands, he said.

Mr Asturias said the business of adoption had also had a wider effect, in that rumours had spread - especially in small Mayan towns and villages - that children were "being stolen to be sold as adopted children".

The anxiety and anger caused by such rumours had in the past led to people believed to be involved in the adoption business being lynched or stoned, he added.