Tuesday, February 1, 2011

IAN and the increased demands at Embassy

Over the last few weeks, we have seen increased demands with the I604 investigations at the Embassy in Addis Ababa. In the past, they have requested the following documents be submitted for an Embassy interview:

1. Passport and copy.
2. Original birth certificate with 1 copy.
3. DS-230 form filled.
4. Two 5X5 photographs.
5. Adoption Decree (Amharic and Translated) original and copy.
6. Adoption contract (Original and copy)
7. Copy of Power of Attorney.
8. Kebele documents (translated and Amharic) with one additional copy.

After the Embassy reviews the paperwork, they will let us know if the family is cleared or if they require any further paperwork. The documents the Embassy requests vary depending on each child’s case. In order to hopefully reduce the percentage of cases they request additional documents for (as stated in the conference call, 90%), we are taking the following steps:
~ We have two new full time employees at IAN in Ethiopia, the new social worker and Yared.
~ The new social worker will be checking all paperwork for any errors.
~ Yared will work with Abebe to help with checking in with the Embassy, communicating with our US staff and simplifying the process as much as possible.
~ We have compiled the list of Embassy requests from the past few groups so if requested by the Embassy again, our staff will be able to gather these items quickly.

Additional documents have been requested by the Embassy that are specific to each child’s case. We are unable to gather all of this information on each child ahead of time because we do not know what the Embassy will ask for and many requests require the birth parents be questioned. We do not want to create any additional stress on the birth families.

Please know that our staff in the US and Ethiopia are working extremely hard, day and night, to help bring these children home as soon as possible.

~ Joan Strauss, Executive Director

1 comment:

elisabeth said...

Thanks! This is so helpful to know.