Russian President Vladimir Putin is defending a proposed law that would ban Americans from adopting Russian children.

During a marathon news conference Thursday in Moscow, Mr. Putin acknowledged the bill recently passed by the State Duma, or lower house of parliament, was an “emotional” response to a new U.S. law that imposes sanctions on Russian officials suspected of human rights violations.

But he said the State Duma's action was “appropriate.”

Russia's proposed law is named after Dima Yakovlev, a young Russian child who died in 2008 after his adoptive U.S. family left him locked for several hours during a hot day.

Mr. Putin angrily complained that many U.S. courts failed to convict parents whose Russian-born children died while under their care, and that the judges would not let Russian officials attend the hearings as observers.

The new U.S. law is named after Sergei Magnitsky, a Russian anti-corruption lawyer who died in prison in 2009 after exposing an official corruption ring involved in the embezzlement of $250 million in tax money. The law was approved as part of legislation that lifted trade restrictions on Russia dating back to the Cold War era