We have been working in Kazakhstan since 1999, and we completed our first adoptions there in 2000. We have placed children from the same orphanage for over ten years - we have a great working relationship there, and we love seeing the improvements that have been made over the years.

 Unfortunately, the country closed their adoption program in May of 2010, when Kazakhstan began their transition into a Hague country. Information is below from the Kazakhstan Consulate, as well as from the US Department of State.  We will update this page as soon as we have concrete information as to when adoptions will resume in Kazakhstan.  We are looking forward to continuing our work to help orphans in that country. 
_____________________________________________

Notice from the Consulate General of the Republic of Kazakhstan, in NYC, where CAH files are submitted, May 2010: The Consulate General of the Republic of Kazakhstan in New York would like to inform that the Government of Kazakhstan continues to streamline and upgrade its international adoption system and to that end Kazakhstan has joined the Hague Convention on International Adoption. Having joined the Convention, the Republic of Kazakhstan, as prescribed, started the process of bringing its national legislation, including the Marriage and Family Code, in compliance with the Convention requirements.  In this regard and to avoid any mistakes and confusion in the process of building the dossiers for prospective adoptive families due to the ongoing legislation reform, the Consulate General temporarily suspends the acceptance of dossiers for adoption until further announcement.  The Consulate General of the Republic of Kazakhstan in New York apologizes for any inconvenience this may cause.

Notice from the US Department of State, Bureau of Consular Affairs, Office of Children's Issues, October 2010:  Kazakhstan will become a party to the Hague Convention on Protection of Children and Co-operation in Respect of Intercountry Adoption (Convention) on November 1, 2010.  Government of Kazakhstan stated it will not accept any new intercountry adoption dossiers until it completes adoption reforms, which is expected to be March 2011, at the earliest.  
_____________________________________________

At this time, no adoption agencies are able to submit dossiers to the Kazakhstan Consulate or Embassy.  We will post more information here when we have it.  All of the CAH families whose dossiers were sent to Kazakhstan in May 2010 have successfully completed their adoptions, and are now home with their beautiful children (none of our dossiers were returned from Kazakhstan!) - check the "news" page of this site to see a list of children recently adopted through our Kazakhstan program. Please contact Janice, the director of Children at Heart, at 910.763.4414 if you have questions on when you should start working on your adoption in Kazakhstan. 

_____________________________________________

  For more information on our Kazakhstan program, please fill out the information request form on the contact page of our website.

Revised 02/07/12