Damascus: Embassy planned kids' abduction

The Dutch embassy in Syria offered to help the Dutch kids who'd been abducted by their father. This, according to Ammar Hafez, 13, who had just recently returned from a half year stay in the embassy.

"Our mother came here in June." Says Ammar, "She stopped also by the embassy. They they told her that if Sara and Ammar want to go back to the Netherlands, they could come to the embassy."

The Dutch Foreign Ministry denies that the embassy had given such advice to the family. According to a spokesman, the embassy came into play only when the kids came to the gates of the embassy. The kids fled from their father after receiving a call from their mother in the Netherlands.

The kids' father had accused the embassy from the start of collaborating in the abduction of his kids.

More interviews (in Dutch) can be seen on the site of Jeugdjournaal.

Source: Nu.nl (Dutch)

Damascus: Children coming home

Sara and Ammar, the two Dutch kids who have spent the last half year hiding in the Dutch embassy in Damscus, are finally coming home today and will be home for Christmas.

The children were supposed to board a plane this morning and are expected to land this afternoon in Schipol, according to a spokesman of the Dutch Foreign Ministry.

After months of negotiations between the Dutch and Syrian authorities, their father has finally agreed to have his children go back to the Netherlands.

Source: Telegraaf (Dutch)

Damascus: Kids to be freed soon

Syrian president Assad has assured Dutch Foreign minister Bot, that the two kids hiding in the Dutch embassy in Damascuss will be able to go back home by the end of the month.

Bot came to Syria prepared to bring the kids back with him, however various issues still had to be taken care of before the kids could leave. Assad has personally promised to make an effort so that this story will end well as soon as possible.

Source: Telegraaf (Dutch)

Syria: Celebrating St Nicholas in the Dutch embassy

Sara and Ammar, the two Dutch kids who fled their father in Syria and are taking refuge in the Dutch embassy are still there. Five months later.

This past weekend the Dutch celebrated the Feast of St. Nicholas and the two kids got a visit from Saint Nicholas himself. St. Nicholas was visiting various expats throughout the day and decided he couldn't skip the two.

According to their mother they were very excited and called her up. She is realizing that they're starting to reconcile themselves to the fact that they're still there and though she is glad they're not as agitated as they used to be, she still hopes they'll be coming home soon.

Together with De Telegraaf she has set up the Ammar and Sara foundation (Stichting Ammar en Sara). The two kids have received many presents while they're staying in the embassy. The foundation will serve as a fund to buy them gifts when they come home, as well as putting in money for an educational fund.

Source: Telegraaf 1, 2 (Dutch)

See also: Syria: Abducted Dutch kids flee to embassy

Syria: 90 days in the Dutch embassy

Sarah and Ammar Hafez were abducted by their father from their home in the Netherlands to Syria two years ago. More than 90 days ago, they sought refuge in the Dutch embassy. The kids have been hiding there ever since, afraid to leave, since under Syrian law their father has custody over them. The two have since celebrated their birthdays and are still waiting.

Dutch foreign minister Bot has recently announced that he will visit Syria only if he'll be able to return the two kids with him. Bot has been invited by his Syrian counterpart in order to discuss the case, but according to Bot talking is not enough. He also added that he thinks it's Syria's job to convince the father to return the two kids. Syria's position is that the kids will only be allowed to leave with their father's permission.

Source: AD.nl (Dutch)

Meanwhile, the Telegraaf newspaper site opened up a special Dutch language site on the two kids.

For more on the story see also: Syria: Abducted Dutch kids flee to embassy, Syria: Update on Dutch kids, Syria: Dutch kids ask Queen for help, Syria: Kids still waiting, Syria: Dutch looking for mediator

Various News

A few stories from the past couple of days

UK:
Muslims in the UK: Feeling Foreign at Home - an attempt to explain why Britain continues to sprout home grown Islamic terrorists. The article points at factory downsizing. People were fired and never got back on their feet. A good reason as any, apparently, to go blow up the neighbors.

Looking for converts to Islam - a look at converts to Islam in the UK and the way they're seen by extremist Islamic groups. (the students who were fired?)

Sweden:
Integration minister slams integration report - a new report in Sweden suggests far reaching changes in integration policy, none of which will probably be accepted.

Gang smuggled thousands into Sweden - three men will appear in court for smuggling bogus refugees and asylum seekers into Sweden. The gang was caught by anti-terror police.

Leijonborg: no more religious schools - the leader of the Swedish liberal party calls for a moratorium on independent religious schools as a way of stopping Islamic fundamentalism. "If it were up to me to decide, we would introduce a moratorium on religious schools, at least until we had guarantees that all lessons were free of religious content" [ed. religion does not have to stand for anti-democracy and anti-liberalism. It doesn't have to stand for violence and extremism. It could stand for personal, family and national values.]

Germany:
German police capture Lebanese train-terrorism suspect - German police are still looking for his accomplice and suspect they're part of a terror ring (AKA, "group of offenders with signs of a long-term structure").

Denmark:
Radical Muslim convicted for making death threats - Fadi Ahmad Abdel Latif, spokesman for the Danish branch of Hizb-ut-Tahir was convicted of threatening the life of the Danish Prime Minister, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, and inciting to kill Jews and sentenced to 3 months in jail. The conviction could be used to disband Hizb-ut-Tahir.

Syria: Dutch looking for mediator

The Dutch seemed to have hit a wall in the case of the two kids who fled to the Dutch Embassy in Damascus close to two months ago.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is now looking for an external mediator who would be able to negotiate for the release of the two kids. According to a Ministry spokesman the Ministry has considered the idea for a while, but is now thinking about it seriously. "We're looking for an expert in the field of kidnappings or judicial cases. He doesn't have to be by definition Dutch."

Janneke Schoonhoven, the children's mother, says that she came up with the idea. "We're fully dependent on the father and his has accused the embassy of kidnapping. Therefore we need somebody neutral."

Source: Nederlands Dagblad (Dutch)

See also: Syria: Abducted Dutch kids flee to embassy, Syria: Update on Dutch kids, Syria: Dutch kids ask Queen for help, Syria: Kids still waiting

Syria: Kids still waiting

Sarah and Ammar have both celebrated their birthdays recently, in the Dutch Embassy in Damascus. The kids have spent close to two months in the embassy, waiting for diplomatic negotiations between the Netherlands and Syria to allow them back home.

There has even been a suggestion by a Dutch politician to involve the US in order to pressure Assad directly.

Their father, Hisham Hafez, says that they can go back to the Netherlands, when they're 18. Until that time, he says, they belong with him in Damascus. The Embassy is like a jail and they can't continue staying there.

His kids have been interviewed on Dutch TV and said they want to go back to the Netherlands. To which Hafez says: "Then I'll never see them. I'm on the Ineterpol list. They see me as a criminal. I'll be picked up if I come to the Netherlands. That's why I say, when they're 18 they can leave here if they want to, then you wouldn't be able to forbid Ammar and Sara anymore."

Mohammad Hassaan ’Awad, a professor of Islamic Law in Syria, thinks that the kids should be sent back to their mother, Janneke Schoonhoven. The marriage was contracted in the Netherlands and the mother lives there. If that can be proven and the kids want to live with her, then according to Sharia law she should be able to bring them back.

'Awad, who wants to help mediate in the case, says that Sharia law puts the kids' interests in the center and since they have shown countless times that they want to go back to the Netherlands, it should be a possiblity.

Schoonhoven says about her ex-husband: "He has lived in Europe for 30 years. He has double citizenship, Dutch and Syrian, and he has accepted the judgement of the Dutch judge that the kids belong here. If we would have married in Syria and had kids there then I would have had to abide by the law."

Sources: Telegraaf (Dutch), Dagblad van het Noorden 1, 2 (Dutch)

See also: Syria: Abducted Dutch kids flee to embassy, Syria: Update on Dutch kids, Syria: Dutch kids ask Queen for help

Syria: Dutch kids ask Queen for help

Sara and Ammar Hafez have been sitting in the Dutch Embassy in Damascus for four weeks. The two kids, who had been abducted by their Syrian father two years ago and have fled to the Embassy, are now waiting for the diplomats to settle things between their father and the Syrian gov't in order to enable them to go back home to their mother in the Netherlands.

Now Sara has written a letter to Queen Beatrix and Prime Minister Balkenende, asking for help.



In her letter Sara asks for help in getting back to her mother in the Netherlands, and adds that her grandfather is sick and she would like to see him. She says that she had tried to stab herself with a knife. According to their mother, she has been on medicine since. Their mother says this letter is a cry for help and that the children worry that due to the situation in Lebanon they will be forgotten in the embassy for months or years to come.

Source: De Telegraaf (Dutch)

See also: Syria: Abducted Dutch kids flee to embassy, Syria: Update on Dutch kids

Syria: Update on Dutch kids

Slightly more than two weeks ago, two Dutch kids - Sara, 11, and her lightly autistic brother, Ammar, 13 - fled to the Dutch embassy in Damascus. The kids, who have been abudcted by their Syrian father two years ago, want to go back to their mother in the Netherlands. Sara and Ammar ran away when they were visiting their grandparents, stopped a taxi and asked to be taken to the Dutch embassy.

As long as the kids stay in the embassy, or inside diplomatic cars, they are safe. However, once they step foot outside Dutch protection, even on their way to the plane, they can be returned to their father.

The Dutch have therefore been trying the diplomatic method. The Dutch ambassador has been trying to convince the Syrians that since the kids are Dutch and have been abducted from the Netherlands, by whose laws they should be under their mother's care, they should be returned. However, Syrian law says that the father should have custody, and the Syrians aren't signed on anything that obligates them to return abducted kids.

There is currently no solution in sight, and the Dutch embassy is preparing to have the two kids stay over for a long time.

In a similar case two Belgian-Iranian sisters, Yasmine and Sara Pourashemi, fled their father to the Belgian embassy in Iran. They stayed there for 154 days until finally they were allowed to return home.
Currently, the father demands to see a delegation from the Netherlands and continues to blame the embassy for kidnapping his kids.

Last year, a team from the TV show Vermist (Missing) tried making contact with the kids, and setting up a meeting with their mother. The father agreed, as long as the mother doesn't come. However, when the show team showed up, he called the police, saying they tried to abduct the kids with a gun. It turned into a diplomatic incident with the Dutch ambassador coming to apologize.

This is a link to a news video about the case. It is in Dutch, but even non-Dutch speakers might find it interesting, as the pictures speak for themselves.

It includes a short home video of Sara, begging to come home. She says that she doesn't like it in Syria and wants to go back to the Netherlands. That her father doesn't allow it and that he hits her whenever she asks about it.

Sources (in Dutch): Vermist (1, 2) , NOS

See also: Syria: Abducted Dutch kids flee to embassy

Syria: Abducted Dutch kids flee to embassy

Two Dutch kids, brother and sister ages 12 and 10, who have been abducted by their father to Syria have sought refuge in the Dutch Embassy in Damscus. The kids have been residing in the Embassy building for the last 12 days, afraid to leave and being returned to their father.

The two kids are apprently from a Dutch non-Muslim mother and Muslim father. They were abducted in August 2004 when the Dutch courts awarded custody to the mother.

The Syrian press is accusing the embassy personnel of abducting the kids, a charge they're denying.

According to the embassy spokesman "this is an exceptionally sensitive affair. We've contacted the father, mother and Syrian authorities in order to find a solution. Besides, the interests of the kids comes naturally in first place."

According to Syrian law, the father has custody over his kids. Dutch law had already decided that the mother has custody. The kids seemed to have said their say when they took a taxi on their own and went to their embassy to ask for help.

Source: Trouw (Dutch)


Update July 7th, 2006

The children cannot be returned under the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction since Syria did not sign that convention (along with countries such Algeria, Egypt and Morocco).

There are about 120-130 abduction cases a year. In 60% the abducters are the mother who live outside the Netherlands at the time of the divorce and abduct their kids back to the Netherlands. In 40% it's the father who takes his kids back to his fatherland.

Source: NRC (Dutch)