By SHAUNA ANDERSON
Five-year old Zareen should have started school in Melbourne this year.
She should be making new friends and playing tip.
She should be watching Frozen in her Melbourne home and pestering her older siblings to play with her.
But she’s not.
Because five-year-old Zareen has been trapped in Egypt for over a year unable to come home to where her two older siblings live, unable to start school.
Her mum, Amaal Finn, is now there with her, living in a small apartment afraid to leave the door — all because her estranged husband placed a travel ban on her and her daughter, preventing them from leaving Egypt, even though he is living in Melbourne himself.
In 2012 the family travelled to Egypt together with Amaal’s husband, Mazen Hassan Baioumy. It was then that he prevented the then three-and-a-half year old Zareen from returning to Australia with her mother.
Her mum flew back to Egypt to try and get a court order to allow her daughter to come home – and has been there ever since. Her two older children a son aged 12 and a 14-year-old daughter remain in Melbourne.
Despite an Australian court ordering Baioumy to lift the travel ban, he has not done so.
The Herald Sun reports the mother is entangled in expensive legal proceedings in Benha, Egypt, which has cost her and her family almost $100,000.
Foreign Affairs Minister Julie Bishop has been approached by Amaal on several occasions but has not responded to the family.
News Limited reports that the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade spokeswoman said, “The government had no standing to intervene in court matters involving Australians overseas.”
On a Facebook page set up by Amaal’s family, a poster writes of the threats Amaal faces, writing that there has “been multiple death threats against Amaal, violence against people helping Amaal, and two attempted kidnappings – one by Baioumy’s family and another by thugs hired by them.”
Child recovery specialist Colin Chapman told News Limited it was common for cases like this to take up to two years to resolve.
He said he can’t understand why the won’t intervene at least with a letter.
“A letter isn’t asking much. The Government can say, our courts have ordered this to be done … perhaps you can take a closer look at it,” he said.
Amaal has set up a Change.org petition to try and get Foreign Minister Julie Bishop involved in her case.
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Top Comments
Horrid man. Australia needs to step in here.
How? Even if the government did something the cries of being racist would quickly be used. Actually you yourself have opened 18c if he is 'offended' by your horrid remark.
Wow, you really need to think before commenting, guest, and try using a dictionary. The word 'horrid' is not racially charged at all. That man has deliberately left his wife & daughter in a country where he knows that as females they have fewer legal rights. His actions are controlling and horrible. That is why I think that 'horrid' is a good adjective to use for this low-lifes. Anybody who treats their family like that ought to be ashamed of themselves.
Wow, you really need to think before commenting, guest, and try using a dictionary. The word 'horrid' is not racially charged at all. That man has deliberately left his wife & daughter in a country where he knows that as females they have fewer legal rights. His actions are controlling and horrible. That is why I think that 'horrid' is a good adjective to use for this low-life. Anybody who treats their family like that ought to be ashamed of themselves.
"Despite an Australian court ordering Baioumy to lift the travel ban, he has not done so.". Why does he have the power to ban someone's travel? Is he a politician or something? Maybe I'm being too simplistic here, but I don't understand why he has all the power and he's not even over there.
It will be to do with the way the law works over there, where women are not allowed to travel unless they have the permission of their husband or father.
Yes, he's in Australia, the land of the free, where apparently our authorities don't even care enough to chase him down and make him lift the travel ban. And who did the 3 year old stay with in Egypt when the rest of the family, including the mother, flew home to Australia after their holiday in 2012? Is he trying to hint that the child is not his? And after Peter Greste, I won't even bother to comment on an Egyptian court that would order a 3 year old child stay behind when the rest of the family, including the mother, went back to Australia. There's something very strange about this whole saga.
Because females don't have any rights according to the religion that cannot be named.
From what I understand, in Egypt men have the power to request a travel ban be placed on family members.
The only way for the ban to be lifted is for him to request it, or for an Egyptian court to overrule the ban.