Treaty Office

The aim of the Convention is to take account of social and legal developments while keeping to the European Convention on Human Rights and bearing in mind that the child’s best interests must always take precedence over any other considerations.

The new provisions introduced by the Convention are the following:

• The father’s consent is required in all cases, even when the child was born out of wedlock.
• The child’s consent is necessary if the child has sufficient understanding to give it.
• It extends to heterosexual unmarried couples who have entered into a registered partnership in States which recognise that institution. It also leaves States free to extend adoptions to homosexual couples and same sex-couples living together in a stable relationship.
• The new convention strikes a better balance between adopted children’s right to know their identity and the right of the biological parents to remain anonymous.
• The minimum age of the adopter must be between 18 and 30, and the age difference between adopter and child should preferably be at least 16 years.

• 1967 European Convention on the Adoption of Children (ETS No. 58).
• Translations sorted by non-official languages.
• Note for information - Accession to the European Convention on the Adoption of Children (Revised) by a State which is not a member of the Council of Europe.

• Directorate General Human Rights and Rule of Law - European Committee on Legal Co-operation (CDCJ)