In a written declaration adopted by the European Parliament on international adoption in Romania, the Parliament calls on the Romanian authorities to take due account of Parliament’s opinion and to consequently resume without delay consideration of pending cases of international adoptions, in the best interests of the children, and to authorise international adoption where appropriate, given that:

the Hague Convention of 29 May 1993 on the protection of children and cooperation in the field of intercountry adoption, which has been ratified by Romania, provides for essential precautions in the fight against trafficking in children and promotes the best interests of the child; in June 2001 the Romanian authorities imposed a moratorium on international adoption, which was replaced on 1 January 2005 by a law on the protection of children; this moratorium was retroactive to 1 December 2000 and consequently abruptly interrupted consideration of several thousands of applications for adoption; the children whom these applications concerned had already, over a long period, established contacts with their future adoptive families, and whereas this moratorium has therefore placed them for a second time in the situation of being abandoned; in its resolution of 15 December 2005 on the extent of Romania's readiness for accession to the European Union, Parliament urged the Romanian Government to settle the cases of applications for international adoption made during the moratorium of June 2001. To date, the Romanian government has not responded to this call.