ST. PETERSBURG, March 6 - RAPSI. The adoption process of 33 children residing in a St Petersburg orphanage has been suspended, Child Rights Commissioner for St. Petersburg Svetlana Agapitova told a news conference on Wednesday.

"We are waiting for the Education Ministry's resolution on the matter," she said. "They will draft the procedure for the Dima Yakovlev Law, and inform us whether or not we should reject the individuals who petitioned for adoption while the law was under development, or if the law only applies to new applicants."

Twelve of the 33 children who have already met with their US adoptive families have disabilities, she said.

Agapitova cited the statistics for the 194 St. Petersburg children adopted by foreign nationals in 2012, including 14 with disabilities. Fifty-nine went to the United States, 58 to Italy, 25 to Israel, 11 to Finland, and three to New Zealand.

As many as 1,738 children were adopted by Russian families.

The adoption debate rekindled after Russia adopted the so-called Dima Yakovlev Law banning US families from adopting Russian children.

Commenting on the ban, the Russian authorities called for easing adoption formalities in Russia to encourage more Russian families to adopt.