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UP FOR GRABS: Baby girls at an orphanage in Bac Ninh province near Hanoi on Wednesday. Vietnam's top adoption official says concerns raised in the US Embassy report are 'groundless'. -- PHOTO: AP
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HANOI - VIETNAM has failed to police its adoption system, allowing corruption, fraud and baby-selling to flourish, according to the US Embassy here.
A bilateral agreement intended to ensure that adoptions are above board appears to be at risk now.
A nine-page embassy document describes brokers scouring villages for babies, hospitals selling infants whose mothers cannot pay their bills, and a grandmother giving away her grandchild - without telling the child's mother.
'I'm shocked and deeply troubled by the worst of the worst cases,' said Mr Jonathan Aloisi, deputy chief of mission at the embassy in Hanoi.
Vietnam's top adoption official called the concerns 'groundless'. Bribery of orphanage officials may occur, but serious offences such as baby-selling or kidnapping are not a problem, said Mr Vu Duc Long, director of the Department of International Adoptions.
'The American side is trying to make it seem like this agreement is ending because of violations by the Vietnamese side,' he said. 'It's not fair for them to blame us.'
The dispute comes amid a boom in adoptions from Vietnam. Americans - including actress Angelina Jolie - adopted more than 1,200 Vietnamese children over the 18 months ended March 31.
Last year, adoptions surged more than 400 per cent from a year earlier, with 828 Vietnamese children adopted by American families.
While China remains the most popular overseas country for adoptions, a growing number of Americans are looking to Vietnam, which has fewer restrictions.
The wait for adoption approval is also longer in China after the authorities there tightened rules.
US adoption agencies active in Vietnam said that despite some cases of wrongdoing, most adoptions in the country are ethical.
'Our experience has been a good one,' said Ms Susan Cox, vice-president of public policy with Holt International Children's Services, based in Eugene, Oregon, which has been operating in Vietnam since the 1970s.
'We are concerned about any unethical practices, but I would not agree that these cases are indicative of adoptions in Vietnam.'
The United States suspended all adoptions from Vietnam in 2003 over concerns about corruption. Adoptions resumed in 2006 under a bilateral agreement intended to ensure they were above board.
That agreement expires on Sept 1, and many adoption agency officials believe the Vietnam programme will be suspended again, at least temporarily.
'I can't see any possible way that this agreement is going to continue,' said Mr Tad Kincaid of Orphans Overseas in Portland, Oregon. 'There's certainly going to be a lapse.'
The US Embassy report is based on a review of hundreds of adoptions since they resumed in Vietnam in 2006.
Many people involved in Vietnamese adoptions strictly adhere to adoption laws, US officials say.
But others have been flooding the system with cash to get babies for American parents, who pay up to US$25,000 (S$34,000) for an adoption.
With 42 US adoption agencies licensed in Vietnam, the competition for babies is intense.
The report says some orphanages have pressured birth mothers to give up their babies in return for about US$450 - nearly a year's salary for many.
Some agencies have also been paying orphanage directors US$10,000 per referral, the report says, and some have taken orphanage directors on shopping sprees and junkets to the US in return for a steady flow of babies.
US Embassy officials began raising questions last year after their routine investigations turned up widespread inconsistencies in adoption paperwork.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
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