Ottawa can't stop Canadians from buying Romanian babies

A United Nations commission in Geneva was told last week that thousands of Romanian babies and toddlers have been sold to adoptive parents in Canada, the United States and Western Europe since the fall of Nicolae Ceaucescu. in December, 1989.

As many as 500 of the "purchases" of Romanian children were made by Canadians and processed unwittingly through the Canadian embassy in Bucharest, according to Defence for Children International.

Rita Markland of International Social Service Canada, part of a Romanian government adoption advisory committee, says overseas adoptions put immigration officials "between a rock and a hard place."