Thread by @UptheCypherPunx

THREAD: Yesterday, @RayJoha2, @ricobrouwer & myself had the pleasure of talking to Ms. Roelie Post [@roelie_post], a children's rights advocate & whistleblower from the European Commission who exposed child trafficking via for-profit international adoptions.

Know her name.

.@roelie_post is a Dutch political scientist who worked for the European Commission for 35 years, focusing on children's rights, including in Romania where her job was to ensure that children's rights were being respected, that these kids had decent living conditions, etc.

She was also responsible for helping to reform child protection laws in Romania, including the field of adoption, which she found was basically just a "market for children". She wrote about it in her book, which ya'll should check out:

roeliepost.com

Putting it simply, what she saw was that children in Romania were being taken from their (often poor) parents, labelled "orphans" and sold internationally for profit under the guise of "international adoption". This is legalized child trafficking in the EU.

Even after the Romanian government declared that this practice would no longer be allowed, that Romanian kids would no longer be exported for profit, the adoption lobbyists did and likely still do what they can to get around that. It is a field rife with corruption and abuse.

We all hear about child abuse, child trafficking and corrupt adoption procedures, including in Romania...but @roelie_post is a woman who actually witnessed it from inside the European Commission, fought against it and then came forward as a whistleblower in 2016.

.@roelie_post wrote a letter to Martin Schulz, president of EU Parliament at the time as well as the Dutch PM, requesting whistleblower protection. She highlighted the trafficking of children via the adoption lobby & how she'd been treated for bringing all of this to light.

It didn't go well. @roelie_post was slowly pushed out of her job for years before getting fired in 2018. Not only that, she was given no severance pay, lost her pension, and is actually being ordered to pay THEM (EU commission) money back for her salary from 2016 onward.

There is a lot more to this story, of course. But the point is that @roelie_post is a children's rights warrior who witnessed severe misconduct in her field, and then took the courageous step of bringing that information forward. She is a bright light in a pitch black cave.

.@roelie_post continues to speak out about her case, about what she saw in Romania and from the European Commission. In 2008 she started an organization, 'Against Child Trafficking' where she continues to raise awareness and fight against these horrendous practices.

Here is an interview with @roelie_post where she goes into more detail about her situation. It is in Dutch with English subtitles. I highly recommend giving it a listen and hearing this incredible woman's story in her own words.

Here is another interview with @roelie_post by @ricobrouwer a few months ago. It is also in Dutch, with English subtitles in the first 20 minutes or so.

And another

So, people...if you support whistleblowers, and/or if child abuse and trafficking is something that you feel strongly about, @roelie_post is a woman you should know of. Let's support her like we support the other truth-tellers of this world. She is more than deserving of it.