Adoption Adoptions of Belarussian children to Irish couples will resume in the autumn, Belarussian authorities have informed the Irish Adoption Board.
The Belarussian government has also told the Adoption Board it is to introduce new legislation to allow for the registration of adoption facilitators.
The Irish Adoption Board registrar, Mr Kiernan Gildea, said yesterday there are couples waiting to go to Belarus to adopt children, but he would not say how many.
The Adoption Board said previous requests to the Belarussian authorities to nominate facilitators to help Irish couples with the adoption process went unheeded, despite complaints by the authorities that Irish couples were using facilitators who were not tax compliant.
The Belarussian authorities suspended adoptions to Irish couples last May claiming they were too selective in their choice of children.
However, the Adoption Board said in May they had no evidence for this.
In 2003, 39 Belarussian children were adopted to Irish couples compared with 27 in 2002 and 11 in 2001.
Other popular countries for adoption last year were Russia (140), China (50) and Vietnam (40).
Meanwhile in the past few weeks the Romanian authorities have put a stop to all inter-country adoptions, leaving many Irish couples in limbo.
Ms Sharon O'Driscoll, of the voluntary organisation Inter-Country Adoption Association, says she knows of two couples who already have Romanian children and were in the process of adopting their siblings. However, all their efforts have now been thwarted.
The Adoption Board is also calling on the Irish government to ratify the Hague Convention on the Protection of Children in Inter-Country Adoption as soon as possible.
The Hague Convention allows for regulation of inter-country adoption.