Adopt from Kazakhstan

Kazakhstan is the ninth-largest nation in the world and reaches the size of the whole Western Europe. Located south of Russia and west of China, Kazakhstan is a land of vast open terrains, spectacular mountains and modern cities.

While Kazakh has the status of the "state" language, Russian is declared the "official" language and is spoken by significant majority of population. Citizens are comprised of Kazakh, Russian, Chinese, Mongolian, Turkish, German, Armenian and Korean ancestry. A distinctive national characteristic of the Kazakhstan people is their exceptional hospitality.

Kazakhstan’s abundant supply of mineral and natural resources, such as oil, coal and gas, has attracted billions of foreign investments. Since the country’s independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, Kazakhstan has been drastically improving the quality of life of its citizens. The cities offer an abundance of world class hotels, restaurants, shopping centers and entertainment amenities. Kazakhstan requires that adoptive parents prepare a dossier before they are invited to travel and given a referral of a child. The dossier must be translated and certified by the Kazakhstan Embassy in Washington DC prior to being submitted to the Ministry of Education (MOE) of Kazakhstan in Astana, the entity that controls and maintains the databank of all orphaned children in Kazakhstan.

According to the Kazakhstan law, orphaned children are required to be registered with the Ministry’s Database for at least six months before they are eligible for international adoption. The MOE determines what region the adoptive parents would travel to adopt from based on availability of children.

After a region is determined, the Regional Department of Education issues an invitation for parents to travel. Adoptive parents do not receive any information on a child prior to their travel. However, parents are not invited to travel unless there is a child or children available for adoption who match their gender and age preferences. Once the family arrives to the region, they are provided pictures and medical information on a child prior to meeting the child. If a family cannot find a child in one region, then the Ministry of Education will issue permission for the family to go to another region.

Once you submit your completed dossier, we will review your dossier and send it to a translator to be translated, which will take about 1-2 weeks. After dossier translation is completed, your dossier is sent to the Kazakhstan Embassy in Washington DC for dossier registration, which can take anywhere from 2 to 4 weeks.

Then the dossier is sent to our associate in Astana, who first takes the dossier to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to get the apostille seals on the documents legalized and then submits your dossier to the Ministry of Education. In 1 to 4 months after your dossier arrives to Kazakhstan, you will be issued an invitation to travel.

What happens after you bring your child home?

Parents agree to register their child or children with the Kazakhstan government prior to leaving Kazakhstan. The cost to do so is borne by Parents. Currently, the registration fee is $350. Kazakhstan only permits international adoption with countries whose adoption agencies enforce this requirement. In compliance with Kazakhstan law, Parents agree to provide A Helping Hand Post Adoption reports, at their own expense. Each Post Adoption report has to be accompanied by 20 different current photographs per adopted child. These photographs should be all originals printed on photo paper – no photocopies!

Kazakhstan Post Adoption reports is at six months after the court hearing, then at 18 months and every year thereafter, until the child turns 18 years of age. The first 4 Post Adoption reports are to be written by a licensed social worker. The remainder can be self-prepared by Parents. All Post Adoption reports are to be notarized and apostilled before sending to A Helping Hand. Kazakhstan may change Post Adoption requirements at any time and Parents agree to comply with changes as dictated by Kazakhstan laws.

Requirements:

Prospective parents must meet the following criteria. These policies are the requirements of the Ukrainian adoption system; they are not requirements imposed solely by AHH. If you have any questions regarding any of these requirements, please contact us.

• Married couples are eligible to adopt and must be married for at least 1 year.
• Applicants to adopt must be at least 25 years old.
• Maximum age for prospective adoptive parents is 49.
• Single women up to 49 years old can adopt.
• Parents under 49 will have a better chance of adopting infants.
• Both parents must be U.S. citizens.
• Only 2 divorces are allowed per each adoptive parent.
• Parents cannot have any criminal records.

For fees and estimated costs please contact us.

Risks

We will gladly assist you with state, federal and the Republic of Kazakhstan's legal and social work associated with applying to the Ministry of Education of Kazakhstan for a child. Although problems with dossiers are extremely rare, once received at the Ministry of Education, we cannot guarantee a particular result with respect to that application. Any sovereign nation exercises its own discretion with respect to adoption applications, can establish new guidelines as to the type of child which is adoptable or the type of couple that can adopt, can partially close its program, or can even stop international adoptions altogether.

Additionally, medical and/or developmental delays may exist in internationally adopted children, including children adopted from Kazakhstan. Orphanage medical reports will be brief and less sophisticated generally than medical reports prepared in the United States. We did not prepare these reports and cannot guarantee their contents.

We suggest that adoptive parents talk to as many other couples who have completed the adoption process as possible and we predict that you will find very positive responses to health questions, but please check for yourself the experiences of others.

Finally, institutionalized children may have experienced some developmental delays that are almost unavoidable. These precious children may not have been nurtured as you will nurture them, given the generally understaffed and under-funded status that most orphanages find themselves in.

Some of the problems that can possibly arise and have arisen in children adopted from Kazakhstan are:

• scars,
• milk intolerance,
• low or high grade heart murmur,
• defective heart valve that requires surgery,
• rickets,
• scabies,
• crossed eyes,
• cleft lip and/or cleft palette,
• hepatitis A, B or C,
• parasitic infection,
• colds and pneumonia,
• attachment delays or problems,
• under stimulation/delayed development,
• undiagnosed congenital problems,
• effects of institutionalization,
• fetal alcohol syndrome,
• vision and hearing problems, and
• malnutrition.

By proceeding with A Helping Hand, families certify that they have considered the risks mentioned about and as such assume all health, developmental or governmental risks associated with the adoption.