The future of an Indonesian-born child with Irish citizenship who was left by his adoptive parents in an orphanage in Indonesia last year is now the subject of an international legal tangle.
Tristan Dowse (3) is at the centre of legal investigations being carried out by the Irish Adoption Board, the Department of Foreign Affairs and the Indonesian ministry for the interior. The parents' solicitor and the child's extended adoptive family are also involved in efforts to decide who will take responsibility for Tristan.
While all parties are trying to resolve the legal quagmire, the child remains in the orphanage, speaking and understanding only English.
Tristan was adopted by Irishman Joe Dowse and his wife Lala when he was two months old but was left at the Imanuel orphanage outside Jakarta two years later. The parents have now left Indonesia and are living in Azerbaijan. As the adoption was certified by the Adoption Board, Tristan is an Irish citizen and has an Irish passport.
Dr Makmur Sunsusi of the Indonesian ministry of social affairs alleges the adoption was illegal but also says the child is an Irish citizen living illegally without a visa in Indonesia.
Mr Dowse denies the adoption was improper.
Yesterday, the registrar at the Adoption Board, Kiernan Gildea, said the case was unprecedented and difficult as it was not an inter-country adoption.
He said they had 20 or 30 cases a year where an Irish couple adopted a child while they were abroad; sometimes it was from a third country, for example an Irish couple living in the US adopting a Mexican child.
"The Adoption Board only gives a certificate where we have examined the law of the country where the child is adopted and found it to be on a par with Irish law. We then recognise it as an Irish adoption," he said.
The laws in that country should be as stringent as Irish laws. "We take it on face value. If the order is made under Indonesian legislation then we recognise it as a foreign adoption and give it the certificate."
The board had looked at the adoption law in Indonesia in 1992 and in 2002 and found it to be on a par with Irish law. It had looked at the documents which the couple presented and an entry in the register was approved, Mr Gildea said. Legally, the Adoption Board had recognised the adoption in Indonesia, he said.
Only the High Court here could delete an entry in the adoption register, perhaps on the grounds of neglect, parents having died, or abandonment, but always in the best interest of the child, Mr Gildea said. The parents would have to apply to the High Court.
The Adoption Board had asked the Department of Foreign Affairs to clarify a number of issues with the Indonesian authorities, including the status of the adoption, but whatever the opinion, the application to the High Court would still have to be made.
The board had 450 inter-country adoptions a year by couples here who adopted in another country and brought the child back, Mr Gildea added.
Mr Dowse's solicitor, Gus Cullen of Gorey, Co Wexford, refused to comment when contacted yesterday.
Mr Dowse previously said they left Tristan at the orphanage because the adoption "was not working out".
"It wasn't something that we felt was in Tristan's interests to remain with us," he said.
A spokeswoman at the Social Services Inspectorate said there were cases of children adopted abroad and brought back here who had then been taken into care.
"We have come across on occasion children who have been adopted abroad being put into care," she said.
"It is very infrequent but it has happened. The cause may be negligence by the family or perhaps a child is difficult to cope with."
She added, however, that there would not be the legal complications that there were in the case in Indonesia.