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In a very recent development, the Greek government has responded to the demands of the activist group Nostos for Greek Adoptees, which had been advocating for years for the restoration of Greek citizenship to Greek-born adoptees. These adopted persons are the approximately 4,000 Greek children who were sent abroad for adoption between 1948 and 1975. The movement sprang from the author’s research and was enriched by dedicated teamwork with Greek adoptees, especially with communication expert and adoptee, Mary Cardaras; DNA wizard and adoptee, Stephanie Pazoles; and Olympia K. Anastasopoulou, the team’s pro bono Legal Counsellor who has since been called to become Special Secretary for Alternative Dispute Resolution in the Greek Ministry of Justice.

On 22 April 2025, the Greek Ministry of Interior announced that it signed a new law into effect that creates a manageable pathway to finally restore the Greek citizenship of the hundreds of children who were adopted from Greece in the 1950s through 1975. The law’s official publication followed on 2 May 2025 (Government Gazette of the Greek Republic, 2 May 2025, Law no. 2108). Despite all the prior hurdles, the goal of most Greek-born adoptees has been to restore essential components of their first identity, through knowledge and nationality. They share this desire with many other adoptee ‘diasporas’ of children too young to make the decision to migrate on their own.

The Greek-born adoptees were given the promise of an expedited track to Greek citizenship on 17 September 2024, by Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, when he granted a personal meeting to the author and Cardaras. The Greek government has now delivered on that promise and resolved a protracted story of adoption and quest—of never being quite done with either. The historic mass adoptions from Greece of the 1950s and 1960s had been covered over by confidentiality and secrecy, which the new law has now dispelled. Public voice has replaced private silence. By issuing the new law, the Greek government has actioned transparency on this forgotten chapter of its postwar history. By accepting direct guidance from us, external and independent advocates, the Greek state has further depolarized aspects of its Civil War trauma related to child placements and evacuation campaigns, which had left a heavy legacy. The resolution of this charged legacy, which so often seemed to be beyond reach, is, therefore, far from an uncomplicated win. For me personally, this cathartic recognition befits an exemplary truth and reconciliation model, which has been my longer-term goal. Our sense of fulfilment is great, as is our sorrow for those adopted persons who did not live to see this day.

The many carefully planned actions of the Nostos team led to the momentous policy reform. Crucially, the actual process and the close involvement leading up to this change had already begun to heal the wounds of the past. The programmed actions of the Nostos team included: two book publications; numerous interactions with officials, policymakers, and journalists; scholarly presentations and popular interviews; various documented and fact-checked press features; intense social media networking; consulting on podcasts and documentary films; a film screening enhanced by an archival exhibition; an online petition; and even the production of a testimony theatre play. The play For Three Refrigerators and a Washing Machine, directed by Kyriaki Mitsou, premiered in London on 24 October 2024 and has now been published (Van Steen 2025). The online petition, which was propelled by Cardaras, garnered more than 75,000 signatures from all around the world. The petition’s tremendous success speaks loudly to the goal of identity preservation that is shared with adoptee activist groups across geographical borders: They, too, seek to restore the recognition and citizenship of the adoptee’s first family and communal identity. Holding that passport of the country of origin is a shared objective among thousands of intercountry adoptees, of older and more recent generations alike. It means holding the key to the right to return of one’s own volition and for as long as one wishes.

For the Nostos team, momentum has always been enhanced through personal contacts, teaching and mentorship, and supporting creative work, while pursuing a program of targeted objectives. Adoptees have contributed much by sharing generously and continuously in those personal exchanges, which constitute yet another form of grassroots adoptee activism. Meanwhile, my own research was always ongoing, and new data and contacts kept coming in. With the Greek-born adoptees coming out of the woodwork and sharing their documentation and lived experience, I have benefited from a robust feedback loop that has kept the issues current and urgent.

The debates about historic intercountry adoption flows hold tremendous currency not only in the United States and the UK, but also in Sweden and the Netherlands, where recent, state-mandated diachronic investigations have laid bare illicit or illegal practices of the past. Independent committees of experts authored the Dutch investigative report (Commissie Onderzoek Interlandelijke Adoptie, 8 February 2021, Rapport and Bijlagen) and the Swedish report (Adoptionskommissionen, 2 June 2025, issued at nearly 1600 pages). Both reports study 65 years of intercountry adoption history and come to similar conclusions about protracted irregularities. They also document numerous illegalities of which the respective state authorities had at least some basic knowledge. Both long-view reports have sent shockwaves through the world of adoption and family formation. But what was overlooked on both occasions, amid the dust stirred by the disturbing findings, is that intercountry adoption to the Netherlands and to Sweden started with Greek children: The two countries took in their first “orphans” from the Babies’ Centre Metera shortly after its opening in 1955. I have come to know many Greek-born adoptees in the Netherlands and some in Sweden, and they confirm the circumstances of their arrival in their new home countries. Therefore, the Nostos team’s next phase of activism will be to press for a Greek investigation that starts in the 1950s and discloses these and other historical connections.

Greece has grappled with its own identity formation as a sending country but is now ready to receive its return-adoptees (in its symbolic as well as literal sense, through the restoration of their Greek citizenship). Like the adoptees, Greece, too, can dispel the f.o.g. of fear, obligation, and guilt. The recent and momentous change that the Nostos team was able to achieve with and on behalf of Greek-born adoptees, and the harmonious way in which it was achieved, may rightly leave models for other adoptee activists and groups, for remedying other historical and cultural deficits. Time to come to terms with “old” adoption histories!

* The author’s research and impact work related to the historic adoptions from Greece has been granted a five-year-long ethical clearance permission from King’s College London, UK.

Notes for further reading, viewing, and searching:

The author gladly makes the following documents available to Greek-born adoptees:

-“Practical Information for Greek-born Adoptees,” updated from the 2019 book Adoption, Memory, and Cold War Greece, by Gonda Van Steen.

-“Suggestions for Further Reading on the Topic of Intercountry Adoptions from Greece in the post-WWII and Cold War Period (1948-1960s)”

-“How to Restore Your Greek Citizenship according to the New Law of 22 April 2025/FEK 2 May 2025,” webinar accessible online at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=05P9PrwRmuY.

Much anticipated: Photograph of Stephanie Pazoles proudly holding her newly issued Greek passport, along with her American passport, 4 September 2025.