Photo credit: Graeme Williams/UNICEF
Following a report released last week by the 2014 Global Report on Trafficking citing Kenya as a source, transit, and destination country in human trafficking, Cabinet Secretaries have imposed an indefinite ban on inter-country adoption of Kenyan children by foreigners. The cabinet has also revoked all licenses for conducting inter-country adoptions in Kenya.
The report on global human trafficking composed by the US State Department also ranked Kenya at Tier 2 Watch List for non-compliance with minimum standards for elimination of human trafficking.
Taking immediate action to the negative report, the Cabinet noted the major loopholes in Kenyan Laws, which does not define child sale, child procuring, child trade, and child laundering as part of child trafficking. This puts Kenya at a very high risk and opens room “for fraudulent, vested interests, masquerading through ownership of children homes, adoption agencies and legal firms representing children, and adopters, to engage in the unscrupulous business of Human Trafficking under the guise of charity,” said the Cabinet.
With this drastic move to ban adoptions, the Cabinet hopes to bring much more needed attention to this matter.
