A/HRC/34/55 “special needs” to render them adoptable abroad when such adoptions are prioritized or facilitated. 2. Illegal domestic adoptions 35. A large number of illegal adoptions committed at the national level at a given time reflect a pattern or modus operandi as well as the involvement of criminal networks. Such cases can be found in all regions of the world and entail the responsibility of the State owing to the direct involvement of State officials and/or the deficiency or permissiveness of State policies. Numerous illegal adoptions have also occurred as part of large-scale past abuses motivated by political or ideological reasons. Other domestic illegal adoptions have been committed for religious or moral reasons, fuelled by gender discrimination and gender-based violence or discrimination against minorities and indigenous peoples. Past cases of large-scale illegal domestic adoptions 36. Gender discrimination and violence based on moral and religious constructs regarding the social or marital status of the mother have been a key driver of illegal adoptions in several countries.24 In Ireland, the so-called mother and baby homes, which were managed by Catholic organizations, and other maternity institutions, were established in the 1920s to deal with unmarried pregnant women and girls and operated until the 1990s. Conditions in those institutions were deplorable and cases of violence against the women were common (e.g. abuse of expectant mothers, forced labour, neglect and detention). Before the 1952 Adoption Act, most children born out of wedlock were placed in foster care, “boarded out” or informally adopted. After passage of the Act, children were put up for formal adoption.25 Consent was improperly induced or forcibly obtained and documents, including illegal birth registrations, were falsified on a large scale. 26 Furthermore, there were cases of intercountry adoptions, in particular to the United States of America, which often resulted from the same illegal practices. 27 37. In several instances, organized forced adoptions driven by prejudice targeted minorities, indigenous communities and other vulnerable groups. 28 In the United States, for example, following the launch of the Indian Adoption Project in the 1950s, hundreds of Native American children were adopted during that decade in order to ensure their assimilation and to take them away from their humble background. Those adoptions were 24 25 26 27 28 For the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, see http://researchbriefings.parliament.uk/ResearchBriefing/Summary/SN06379;for Australia, see www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Senate/Community_Affairs/Completed_inquir ies/2010-13/commcontribformerforcedadoption/index; for Belgium, see http://docs.vlaamsparlement.be/docs/stukken/2014-2015/g356-1.pdf; and, for Switzerland, see www.sodk.ch/fileadmin/user_upload/Fachbereiche/Opferhilfe/ F%C3%BCrsorgerische_Zwangsmassnahmen/f_Information_SODK_F%C3%BCrsorgerische_Zwang smassnahmen.pdf. See www.dcya.gov.ie/documents/publications/20140716InterdepartReportMothBabyHomes.pdf and http://tbinternet.ohchr.org/Treaties/CEDAW/Shared%20Documents/IRL/INT_CEDAW_NGO_IRL_ 21867_E.pdf. Ibid. See https://www.ihrec.ie/download/pdf/ihrc_assessment_of_the_human_rights _issues_arising_in_relation_to_the_magdalen_laundries_nov_2010.pdf. For Australia, see www.humanrights.gov.au/sites/default/files/content/pdf/social_justice/ bringing_them_home_report.pdf; and, for Canada, see www.gov.mb.ca/legislature/hansard/40th_4th/ vol_49b/h49b.html. 9