Russia furious over adopted boy sent back from US.
Russia threatened to suspend all child adoptions by U.S. families Friday after a 7-year-old boy adopted by a woman fromTennessee was sent alone on a one-way flight back to Moscow with a note saying he was violent and had severe psychological problems.The boy, Artyom Savelyev, was put on a plane by his adopted grandmother, Nancy Hansen of Shelbyville.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov called the actions by the grandmother “the last straw” in a string of U.S. adoptions gone wrong, including three in which Russian children had died in the U.S.
The cases have prompted outrage in Russia, where foreign adoption failures are reported prominently. Russian main TV networks ran extensive reports on the latest incident in their main evening news shows.
The Russian education ministry immediately suspended the license of the group involved in the adoption—the World Association for Children and Parents, a Renton, Washington-based agency—for the duration of an investigation. In Tennessee, authorities were investigating the adoptive mother, Torry Hansen, 33.
Any possible freeze could affect hundreds of American families. Last year, nearly 1,600 Russian children were adopted in the United States.
“We’re obviously very troubled by it,” U.S. State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said in Washington when asked about the boy’s case. He told reporters the U.S. and Russia share a responsibility for the child’s safety and Washington will work closely with Moscow to make sure adoptions are legal and appropriately monitored.
