19 Jun The rights of prospective adoptive parents cannot override rights of biological parents

In the case Antkowiak v. Poland (application no. 27025/17) concerned a custody dispute over a child between the applicants, who are prospective adoptive parents, and the biological parents, the European Court of Human Rights has by, a majority, declared the application inadmissible.  

Applicants, a married couple, are Polish nationals who wanted to adopt a baby from K.D. a woman who agreed during her pregnancy to give her child up for adoption. After the birth, the applicants instituted proceedings to adopt the child and to deprive the biological parents of their parental rights. In the meantime, K.D. had however changed her mind and withdrew her consent for adoption. The case was examined at two levels of jurisdiction between April 2011 and December 2016. During the proceedings the courts temporarily ordered contact between the biological parents and the child. The Poznań Regional Court held in a final held that it is the best interests of the child to be with his biological parents. However, the applicant couple has subsequently instituted another set of proceedings, which are also still pending, asking to restrict the biological parents’ parental rights over the child and to be appointed foster parents. The courts issued an interim order that the child should reside with the applicant couple for the duration of those proceedings.

The applicant couple complained under Article 8 (right to respect for private and family life) that the Polish courts had decided to order the child’s removal from their care and to place him with his biological parents. The decision has still to be enforced, pending the outcome of the legal dispute

The Court considered that the domestic authorities had had to deal with the difficult and sensitive task of striking a fair balance between conflicting interests in a complex case. Faced with having to make a complicated choice between two couples who were both found to be fit to raise the child in the domestic proceedings, the authorities’ primary consideration in their decisions, as required by international law, had consistently been to do what was in the child’s best interests. In particular, the Regional Court had carefully analysed the case, balancing the close relationship the child had developed with the applicant couple and the fact that it was not too late to give the child, in view of his young age, the chance to be raised by his biological family. The Court also considered the fact that national courts consulted psychologists, pedagogues and experts in the field of child education when making decisions.

The Court therefore, held that the proceedings had been fair and had safeguarded the applicants’ Article 8 rights under the European Convention.

References from the Official website of the European Court of Human Rights.