Investigation under way into ‘children of the Creuse’

BETWEEN 1963 and 1982 at least 2,150 children were taken to France from overseas region La Réunion in the Indian Ocean, to repopulate the department of Creuse, hit by rural exodus.

Known as ‘les enfants de la Creuse’, a commission has been set up by the Ministry for the Outre Mer to investigate their situations.

Many are still said to be suffering psychologically as well as lacking information on who their original families were.

Campaigners also hope some kind of compensation might be offered.

The children were either orphans, or given up by their parents, and were brought to France to live in host families.

In some cases they never went back and grew up not knowing their birth families.

It is also alleged that some of their adoptive families exploited them for cheap labour on farms.