Malta will soon have a number of agreements with different countries on inter-country adoptions, Social Policy Minister Michael Farrugia said today.

Replying to a Parliamentary questions by Nationalist MP Ċensu Galea and Labour MP Anthony Agius Decelise, Dr Farrugia said discussions with underway with a number of countries, including with Bulgaria with whom a problem raised by Malta’s Health Department regarding additional tests required by Malta was being ironed out.

While Bulgaria offered Hepatitis B and HIV testing, Malta also required Hepatitis C. A draft agreement had been drawn up and would be concluded soon.

Malta was also opening up discussions with India, the US, Slovakia, Poland, the Czech Republic, Kosovo, Albania, Vietnam and Cambodia.

The latter suspended international adoptions in 2009 after several countries voiced concerns about the country's inadequate legal framework for protecting children. Authorities in the US, France and UK had already suspended adoptions from the country in 2001 after they found it to be breaching the 1993 Hague Adoption Convention.

Cambodia has however made progress in this regard and Dr Farrugia said that it was currently reaching MOUs with a number of countries, and Malta was trying to be among the first to be accepted once the country reopened its doors.

Malta was also trying to conclude agreements with Chile and Venezuela and had plans for the Philippines.

Malta also planned to introduce a process to simplify the possibility for adoption from Malta.

On adoptions from Russia, he said that a number were still going on but an agreement was important as requirements in Russia were different from region to region.

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