Investigative Committee head Alexander Bastrykin invited U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder to Russia to discuss cases of violence against Russian children adopted by Americans, the committee said in a Monday.
The letter to Holder, a copy of which was posted on the committee's website, identifies the cases of 13 children. They include Dima Yakovlev, a Russian boy who died in 2008 after his adoptive father left him alone in a car for nine hours, and Ivan Skorobogatov, whose adoptive parents were convicted of involuntary manslaughter for the child's 2009 death from head trauma.
The State Duma informally named a recent law banning U.S. adoptions of Russian children after Yakovlev.
The law was part of Russia's response to the U.S. Magnitsky Act, which uses visa bans and asset freezes to punish Russian officials implicated in the 2009 death of Hermitage Capital lawyer Sergei Magnitsky in pretrial detention.
The Dima Yakovlev law has been slammed by opposition leaders, while the public is divided over the law, opinion polls indicate.
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