Italians tried to adopt 200 children from Belarus but failed

The association's lawyer, Daniele Dorsey, says that this protocol only contains procedural provisions, which means that Italy can sign this letter of guarantee - and the prime minister's signature will not be a political gesture:

"There are agreements on adoption even with countries like China, which is not known to be a democratic country."

The result: instead of helping Belarusian children - bicycles for Moroccan children

Meanwhile, the regional associations that organized trips for Belarusian children to Italy for the summer and Christmas holidays are being closed down all over Italy.

Lucilla Borgarello, together with her husband Alberto Corsani, had been hosting little Belarusians since 2000.

"And in 2019 we saw our guests for the last time - the pandemic came, and then the war... We couldn't even say goodbye to them properly," says Lucilla.

This family first took in people in need in 1996 - and then they were not Belarusians, but Bosnians. When war broke out in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Lucilla raised money to take in a Bosnian mother and her two children. And when the conflict ended and the guests were able to return home, the Italian family still had some money left over to help others. So they decided to help the little Belarusians.

At first, Lucilla thought the Belarusian children would visit her just once - but the story stretched out for years.

"We gave concerts, sold mistletoe at Christmas - and raised about 12,000 euros a year. That was enough to cover most of the expenses of the families who took in the Belarusian children. This amount included visits to doctors that the children visited in Italy and, for example, the purchase of eyeglasses for the children," the Italian recalls.

At the end of the year, the association had 13 thousand euros in its account. The families could not spend this money on Belarusian children as planned. So they sent it to help children in other parts of the world: for example, they bought bicycles for schoolchildren from poor villages in Morocco.