Nadia Dabbagh

MORE INFORMATION ON NADIA

INTERNATIONAL PARENTAL CHILD ABDUCTION

August, 1997

Nadia Dabbagh, was born in 1990 and kidnapped first to Saudi Arabia and then to Syria in 1992.  When her American mother successfully won a Syrian court order affirming her custody, Nadia's father abandoned her there.  Syrian officials refuse to return Nadia to her mother.  Although she is a U.S. citizen, seven years old, and guilty of no crime, Nadia remains captive in Syria.  The authorities there will not tell the U.S. Embassy where she is being held, or by whom. Her father has gone back to Saudi Arabia to avoid the Syrian and U.S. warrants, which the Saudis will not enforce.   Nadia has not seen her mother for five years.  

JANUARY 1998:  

AMERICAN CHILD BEING HELD FOR RANSOM BY SYRIAN AUTHORITIES

A Syrian source revealed that little Nadia Dabbagh will not be allowed to leave Syria or to have contact with her legal custodial mother.   Nadia has been a great source of  income to many Syrians over the past several years.   Nadia was abandoned in Syria over 2 years ago by her abducting father.   The source disclosed that, although the abductor was briefly jailed in Syria, he was able to buy his freedom for the equivalent of $200,000 (US dollars).  He is currently living and working in Kuwait, where other members of his family live.  The abductor, Mohamad Hisham Dabbagh has attempted to elude Syrian authorities for years.   It is doubtful he will ever return to Syria again.   Reports indicate that fourteen members of the kidnapper's family have warrants for their arrest by the Syrian government.  

NADIA HAS BEEN A REAL SOURCE OF REVENUE for many involved.  Reports indicate that Maureen Dabbagh's attorney in Syria, Mr.  Mounir Al-Amoudi, requested that she deposit $25,000 into a French bank account as a retainer before he would take her case to court during custody litigation.  Although Maureen won in the Syrian courts, she was never given her child, nor allowed to see her.  In regards to the amount of money both Maureen and the abductor have spent in Syria, a regional source was quoted as saying "money has been raining from heaven."  

WHILE Maureen Dabbagh can no longer continue to pay Syrian authorities in the hopes of actually having her child returned, she says that she is unsure whether or not she would again pay $200,000 for the promise of ever seeing her child again.   What is certain is that the kidnapping of Nadia Dabbagh has been a generous source of revenue for various Syrian officials.

May 3, 1998

Lebanese sources state that Nadia Dabbagh is being held in Syria by terrorist group known as the Muslim Brotherhood. While he mother continues efforts to rescue her child, Nadia's father continues to elude both U.S. and Syrian Authorities.

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WE CARE ABOUT CHILDREN

INFORMATION GATHERED BY MAUREEN DABBAGH

TO HELP THE PARENTS OF OTHER MISSING CHILDREN

Each year over 350,000 children are abducted by a parent or family member in the United States alone. Of that number, it is estimated that 2,000 to as many as 10,000 children are taken by their non-custodial parent to other countries. This is a worldwide problem and becomes more so every year. Parental kidnapping is a crime.  It is child abuse.

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•In 1993, the International Parental Kidnapping Crime Act, went into effect in the United States, criminalizing the removal or retention of any child under age 16 from the United States in an effort to prevent the other parent rightful access to the child (i.e.joint custody, visitation, etc.).   

•The international community has addressed this problem in several treaties. The Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Parental Child Abduction is a multi-national treaty set in place to return children who have been wrongfully removed. There are currently 44 countries signatory to this treaty.   None of those are Middle Eastern or Persian Gulf countries.  U.S. participation in the Convention was declared by the Congress and enacted into law as the International Child Abduction Remedies Act, codified at  42 USC 11601.

•The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child also calls for the governments which are parties to remedy the incidence of parental abduction. Currently, every country has ratified this treaty except for six.  The United States is one of the non-signatories.  At the order of President Clinton, Secretary of State Madeline Albright has signed the treaty, but her signature must be ratified by the Senate.  Progress is being blocked by conservatives.  Contact your senators to ask that this treaty be ratified!

Note: The addresses and phone numbers for all senators are listed at SENATORS

Still, even with these laws and treaties, the problem is getting worse.  The ease of international travel, combined with a rise in the number of bi-cultural marriages, has resulted in an escalation of international abductions.

The consequences to the children are far-reaching. Research has shown that children suffer varying degrees of emotional and psychological harm when removed from a parent and denied access to that parent's love, attention, and support. When a child is abducted to a Middle Eastern or Persian Gulf county, the problems become greater. Children taken to these countries are most likelyneverto be recovered.  

The least that a child loses when she or he is abducted is their custodial parent, their home, their friends, extended family, school, personal belongings, and probably religion, and certainly their American freedoms and culture. Children are often times told that their left-behind parent is dead or no longer loves them. Children taken to the Middle East and Persian Gulf countries may be forced to abandon English, enter an arranged marriage, placed into child labor, or lose their chance for a formal education, among other possibilities. They may find themselves abandoned emotionally by their kidnapper, who may give them to female relatives to raise.  

The consequences for children of both sexes are severe; for female children, they can be fatal.  Although it is a violation of international law, female genital mutilation is still widely practiced throughout the Gulf and Middle East, and can lead to death through shock or sepsis, as well as contributing to the spread of HIV and to reproductive difficulties later in life.

American mothers who have litigated for custody in Islamic courts have been thrown into prison (at least one case in Saudi Arabia) or granted custody but never allowed to see child or enforce the order (Barbara Mezo/Egypt). Warrants for the arrest of the abductors do very little, if anything. The United States has no extradition treaty with Middle Eastern or Gulf Countries. Abductors are basically protected by their host countries, and out of the legal reach of the U.S.

Islamic law does not automatically grant fathers custody of their children unless that child is of a certain age.  However, in most of the nations which have adopted sharia (traditional Islamic law) as their formal or informal adjudication system, American and European woman are being denied the right to even know where their children are. While the U.S. Department of State has established the Office of Children's Issues to assist left-behind parents, there is little the State Department can do. Parents have now joined together in an effort to bring about greater public awareness and support to the left-behind families, along with many new resources.

•THE RECOVERY OF INTERNATIONALLY ABDUCTED CHILDREN:

A Comprehensive Guide by Maureen Dabbagh.  Published in 1997, the book is an up-to-date history and manual regarding the recovery of children kidnapped to destinations outside the U.S., written by an experienced expert witness and lecturer on the topic.  Dabbagh's own two-year-old daughter was kidnapped to Syria in 1992 and abandoned there by her father.  This book can be purchased directly from McFarland & Co. Inc., Publishers at 1-800-253-2187.  Also available via internet booksellers and in most bookstores by special order if not in stock.  ISBN #0-7864-0289-X, $42.50 in US currency, 216 pp.

•International Child Abduction Law  by Davis, Rosenblatt, & Galbraith.  Information on the contents of a 1993 book by three attorneys on the topic, intended to be a practical guide to the law and the complications that arise after a kidnapping. Concentrates on U.S. and Canadian children. Ordering data is provided, or you can try to locate it through libraries and internet booksellers with the  ISBN #0-421-48990-1, $69.50 in U.S. currency.

•Children's Rights Council - Japan. for cases in which children have been illegally kidnapped to Japan. email: emari@earthlink.com 

•For children who have been illegally kidnapped to Saudi Arabai :                           email: Sauditheft@aol.com or dmcclain@insolwwb.net 

•National Center for Missing and Exploited Children 1-800-THE- LOST

•U.S. Department of State Office of Children's Issues will take questions about international child abduction at 202-736-7000. 

•ICANN: International Child Abduction Attorney Network  ICANN's purpose is to increase legal representation for parents in cases brought under the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction.  The network is being managed by the Parental Abduction Project at the ABA Center on Children and the Law, available by phone at 202-662-1757.

•Hilton House  This website is run as a free public service by an attorney from California.  It contains decisions of courts worldwide on Hague Convention cases, and of states within the U.S. on the implementation of the model Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction Act (UCCJA) and the related federal law, 28 USC 1738A. This federal law requires all U.S. states and territories to honor each other's child custody rulings.  It does not affect foreign countries.

•The Missing Children's Network Canada  A non-profit humanitarian organization based in Montreal, Quebec, Canada whose mission is to assist in the international search for missing children and to educate the public in order to prevent more children from becoming victims of aggression and exploitation.

•FCO: International Child Abduction  This is a British page on this issue, titled "International Child Abduction - Advice for Parents" and is meant to address situations when a child been taken or kept overseas without the consent of the custodial parent in circumstances where their consent is required.

•Illinois Interstate and International Custody Disputes FAQ's  This is a compilation of Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) that, although specific to Illinois state law, may help parents in other states understand the mechanics of the interactions between the states, the feds, and the foreign nations in international custody disputes.

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and the mother of that child who has already brought so many children home