Knowledge is Power

Ever since Vladimir Putin was elected President of Russia in 2000, he has been working on strengthening federal control in Russia. This federal control even extends to adoption laws and processes. In April of 2006, the Russian Supreme Court issued a plenary decision that provided "guidance" to regional judges deciding adoption cases. This ultimately resulted in fewer judges waiving the 10-day appeal period following an adoption hearing.

Yesterday, a new Russian Government decree, called Government Decision No. 423 of May 18, 2009, took effect, standardizing the documents required of anyone seeking to take in a child for fostering or adoption in Russia. It also codifies and names the documents required to be kept for each child in state care. This is the first time, to my knowledge, that the documents kept for a child in state care have been explicitly named by federal regulations.

The long-term effect of this new regulation is that adoptive parents in the future will know what type of information is available about their prospective or adopted children. Depending upon how helpful an agency's personnel are, an adoptive parent typically has to know specifically which documents to ask for before they will be given the information. Most foreigners adopting in Russia don't have that information, and it exposes them to the loss of data that could be important later on.