A child is an unmarried individual under the age of 21. Child is further described as, legitimated child an adopted child or an orphan child. A child is considered legitimated where the father marries the mother or when the child is born out of wedlock is placed legally in the same as the child born in wedlock according to the laws of the land where the legitimation takes place, it must occur before his turns 18 and the father is the biological father.

Adoption is accepting the child of other as one’s own; adoption must be finalized before the child turns 16 years old. The law of the place of the adoption is controlling. The biological parent may not receive any benefits by virtue of their parentage.

For orphan child the biological parents must have died or abandoned the child, or if one parent is alive that parent must be unable to care for the child and release the child via writing for adoption.

There is a special process for adopting children form Hague countries. The convention gives more right to adopting parents and establishes internationally agreed rules for the adoption between treaty countries When determining a case involving an adopted child, one must first determine whether or not the Hague Adoption Convention applies or not. If the child is a resident of a Hague Adoption Country, and the adoption has occurred or will occur after April 1, 2008; then Hague Adoption Convention will apply.

If the child is not a citizen of a convention country, then the Hague rules do not apply, either an I-1-30 immediate relative process is appropriate or an I-600, non-Hague orphan process.

Adjudicating an orphan case requires that, adopting parents establish their eligibilty for an international adoption, usually that is done via an approved I-600A filed with USCIS; adopting parents establish that a particular child may be classified as an orphan, as demonstrated by an approved I-600 petition; A visa application is filed on behalf of the child, providing all necessary documentation for production of the visa and demonstrating that no legal impediments to visa issuance apply – a consular officer will review the application at a U.S. Embassy or Consulate overseas; If approvable, the visa is issued, and the child travels to the U.S. and obtains citizenship, either upon entry or upon completion of a full and final adoption in the U.S.

A US citizen petitioner can obtain immediate relative permission for an orphan who is adopted prior to his or her 16^th birthday. The child must be an orphan because of the death or disappearance of, abandonment or desertion by, or separation or loss from, both parents, or for whom the sole or surviving parent is incapable of providing the proper care and has in writing irrevocably released the child for immigration and adoption.

Instead of final decrees of adoption in many countries a guardianship order is issued, a guardianship order grants to the adoptive parents permission to adopt and to obtain an immigrant visa for the child.

If you seek to classify the child as an abandoned orphan, you must be able to prove that the parents have willfully forsaken all parental rights, obligations, and claims to the child, as well as all control over and possession of the child, without intending to transfer, or without transferring, these rights to any specific person(s). Abandonment must include not only the intention to surrender all parental rights, obligations, and claims to the child, and control over and possession of the child, but also the actual act of surrendering such rights, obligations, claims, control, and possession.

If the child is placed with orphange, the child may fall under one of the other definitions of orphans but will not be considered an abandoned child. For example, such children may be considered orphans because they have been “deserted”-meaning that the parents have willfully forsaken their child and have refused to carry out their parental rights and obligations and that, as a result, the child has become a ward of a competent authority in accordance with the laws of the foreign-sending country.

If there is a sole or surviving parent, the petitioner must prove that the biological parent is “incapable of providing proper care” to the child.

A child may be classified as an immediate relative if there has been a full and final decree of adoption entered before the child’s 16^th birthday and the adoptive parent has had two years of residency with the child and two years of legal custody. The joint residency period may occur before or after the adoption. The residency period may run concurrently with the legal custody period.

 

 

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