Saturday, October 15 2005 19:17 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Islamabad: With hundreds of children rendered orphan by last week's killer quake, Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf has banned adoptions until a proper policy was put in place to decide their fate.

Until a policy is evolved, the children will not be given for adoptions, Musharraf told at a meeting of Federal Relief Commission yesterday (Oct 14, 2005).

The Federal Relief Commission meeting was informed that adoptions have been banned for the time being in order to avoid abuse of children who have lost their parents in the earthquake, reports here said.

Pakistan's Jamait Islami has said that it would oppose any policy to permit foreigners adopting the surviving kids. The party has offered to take responsibility of all children who lost their parents and other relatives during the earthquake.

JI leader Naimatullah Khan told reporters here that his party would strongly oppose any move to hand over these orphans to foreign missionaries and NGOs. "We will not allow the foreign missionaries or NGOs to adopt these children. We will not let foreign missionaries to take these children with them," he said.