Latvian mother appeals for safe return of children
A mother who has not seen her two young children for a month today appealed for their safe return.
Two-year-old Ali Alexsandra Hassan and one-year-old Mohamed Rami Hassan were taken from their home in Swords, Co Dublin, by their Lebanese father.
Their Latvian mother, Baiba Saulite, pleaded for anyone who knew the location of the children to contact gardaí.
“I’m begging people and government and everyone to help me. What I want is just my babies to be back home with mummy.”
She said their father, Hassan Hassan, had told her they would not be coming back.
“This is the worst thing, I don’t know anything about my children. I don’t even know how they are and if they’re OK. These children have always been with me and they must be very upset,” she said.
At Dublin District Court last month Hassan refused to comply with a court order to produce them before Christmas Eve and was remanded in Cloverhill prison.
Gardaí have said the children are now in Lebanon, where they are being looked after by relatives.
Under the Non-fatal Offences against the Person Act 1997, it is illegal for one parent to take a child out of the country without the consent of the other parent or in defiance of a court order.
Ms Saulite said Hassan was still in prison.
“He’s just saying: ‘If he let’s me go, I’ll give the kids back.’ I believe the minute he gets out, he’ll be gone,” she told RTE’s Liveline.
She claimed that Hassan had told her he was Greek – and denied he was a Muslim - when she first met him in Ireland.
“When children were born, then he really started acting in an Islamic way, telling us what we can eat and can’t eat and what I have to wear. He wouldn’t let me go out and see my friends,” she said.
Hassan has been ordered to produce the children before his next court appearance on January 11.
