[sak9645]

The short answer is "no".

By Chinese adoption law, all children adopted by non-related foreigners must be referred by the China Center for Adoption Affairs in Beijing, an arm of the Chinese government.

The children must be living in an orphanage or foster care setting that is certified for international adoption. The children's paperwork must be approved by the CCAA. And the decision to assign them to specific families must be made by the CCAA. This is true whether the children are infants, older children, or children with special needs.

The reason for this strict approach is that, prior to the enactment of China's adoption law in 1992, there were some unethical adoptions. Prospective parents or their attorneys and agencies were dealing directly with birthfamilies and orphanages, bribes may have been used in some cases, and so on.

To keep things from being so freewheeling and reduce the possibility of abuses, China put in place an adoption law that eliminated private adoption by foreigners, required use of not-for-profit licensed agencies accredited by China, reduced contact between agencies/families and orphanages, and so on.

The new law helped to make China's adoption process very highly regarded by parents and agencies for its stability, well-organized process, and ethical conduct. In fact, more U.S. citizens now adopt from China than from any other country in the world.

Interestingly, the adoption law was developed in a way that mirrored Hague Convention #33, which China has just ratified and which the U.S. will ratify, possibly as soon as 1997. So don't expect any relaxing of the rules. If anything, they may become more strict.

Also remember that, even if you traveled to China and somehow got custody of the child in a back-door way, you would not be able to get a visa for him/her to enter the U.S. The U.S. will not grant a visa to a child who does not have the appropriate adoption paperwork, showing the non-profit agency used, the referral from the CCAA, and the child's documents issued by his/her province.

Sharon