The solicitor representing Irishman Joe Dowse and his Azerbaijani wife, Lala, yesterday said his clients denied any involvement in illegally paying for the adoption of their son Tristan in Indonesia.
Indonesian officials investigating the adoption of the toddler have arrested two people whom they believe are members of a syndicate which allegedly sold Tristan and 80 other infants to foreigners over the last five years.
However, Gus Cullen, the solicitor representing the Dowse family, last night said "talk about baby-brokering" came as a surprise to his clients and that "they deny any involvement".
Mr Cullen said he could not comment further on the specifics of the Tristan case as it was currently before the courts.
The Indonesian authorities said yesterday they will declare the four-year-old boy, who was left behind in the country by his adoptive parents when they left the country in 2004, an Indonesian citizen regardless of what Ireland rules on his nationality.
Indonesian child protection official Mr Afrinaldi told The Irish Times yesterday the authorities deliberately left Tristan in legal limbo because they were worried settling his case might compromise an investigation into the syndicate.
Mr Afrinaldi said that while technically Tristan was still Irish, officials were now certain the court ruling granting the adoption was illegal.
"Everything that came after that, including the granting of Irish citizenship, is legally null and void, so as far as I'm concerned we're not going to wait for a decision from Ireland. Once the court ruling is officially overturned, he will be declared an Indonesian citizen again."
The Department of Foreign Affairs said the ambassador to Indonesia, who is based in Singapore, as well as representatives of the Adoption Board, had held talks with authorities in Jakarta on the case last week.
The spokesman said the department could not comment on the claims in Indonesia regarding the adoption of Tristan, given the proceedings currently before the High Court in Dublin.
A spokesman for the Adoption Board said it had not been officially advised about the claims being made about the case by authorities in Indonesia. The board would not comment further as the case was sub judice.
Police said on Monday that they arrested two women, a mother and daughter, on July 25th after Mr Afrinaldi had posed as a businessman wanting to adopt a child illegally from the syndicate.
Detectives said one of the women admitted to acting as the broker between Tristan's natural mother, Suryani, and the network's alleged ringleader, an Indonesian woman married to an American missionary.
The detective leading the case, senior commander Suhardi Alius, said the alleged ringleader had disappeared.
Meanwhile, non-Indonesians have been banned from meeting Tristan at the government-run orphanage where he is now living after being removed in May from the Emmanuel orphanage, where Mr Dowse left him in 2004.
Several local TV crews yesterday filmed Tristan, whose carers are now calling him Erwin. Dressed in a Batman T-shirt, he was smiling and running around at times but in much of the footage he was sullen and sitting in a corner.
Mr Afrinaldi claimed yesterday that whenever Tristan saw a white person now he cuddled up to someone he knew. "He doesn't want to go anywhere near a white person now."
He said social services were currently trying to track his mother, Suryani, to see if she wanted to take him back.
"If we cannot find her then we will look for another adoptive family, but it will have to be Indonesian."
Indonesian law states that children cannot be adopted after their fifth birthday. Tristan has just turned four years old.
Babies were allegedly sold by the syndicate to couples of numerous nationalities.
Mr Afrinaldi said that when he was undercover one of the women involved in the operation told him she knew the babies had been sold to couples from Australia, Britain, Japan and many other countries.