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Two-year-old girl faces deportation from Sweden

Published: 22 Sep 12 09:57 CET | Print version
Online: http://www.thelocal.se/43386/20120922/

A two-year-old girl currently living in a foster home in Skåne in southern Sweden faces deportation to France where, according to her foster mother, she will be placed in an orphanage.

"We'd like nothing more than to adopt her," said the girl's foster mother, Malén Liewehr to the TT news agency.

However as no biological parent has been identified then it the adoption process is complicated.

"We have been told that it could be difficult," Liewehr said.

Malén Liewehr and her husband have two children of their own and a further three girls whom they foster.

The girl in question was placed with the family when she was four months old.

"She can't speak any French. She know no other "mum and dad" aside from my husband and I," Malén Liewehr said.

Sara Skog at Save the Children in Malmö is critical of the Migration Board's handling of the case.

"It is horrible that they can think this way. You can ask whichever expert you like, they all think this way," she said to TT.

Skog argued that the girl will suffer further trauma if she is sent to France to an unfamiliar environment.

"A two-year-old girl has no idea what is happening around her and why," she says, arguing that the Migration Board is ignoring the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC).

"That this would be in the child's best interests is completely absurd," she said.

The child's mother came to Sweden two years ago from Algeria. Twenty days after giving birth to the girl, the mother vanished without trace and she was left in the care of her mother's husband.

The man is suspected of having abused her, according to a report by Sveriges Television. After the girl was admitted to hospital with injuries, she was then placed in the care of the authorities and a foster home was found.

It has not been established if the mother remains alive and the Migration Board's decision to deport the girl has been appealed.

It is unclear where the mother's and the Migration Board's decision has been appealed to the Migration Court of girl's special representative Kerstin Nilsson.

The girl has French citizenship through her mother, who has however never lived in the country.

According to Magnus Rosenberg at the Swedish Migration Board the child's needs will be met in France and underlined that it is very unusual for citizens of other EU countries to be granted a residence permit.

"It is now the responsibility of the French authorities to take the girl," Rosenberg said.

Rosenberg declined to specify whether the girl and her mother had any further ties to France aside from their citizenship.

TT/The Local/pvs (news@thelocal.se)

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11:35 September 22, 2012 by Keith #5083
It seems like,apart from giving birth, the only thing this mother did was to leave her child in a compassionate country.

Whilst public officials are paid by the people, through their taxes, to follow the rules I find it very hard to believe that any Swede that I know would wish to pay these officials.If the foster parents are willing and able to give this child a home, then the State should find a way to do this.In England the child could be made a 'ward of the court' to surmount the difficulties of missing parent/s.,there must be some similar scenario here in Sweden.

This is an exceptional case and calls for exceptional compassion on behalf of the public servants charged with protecting the population.

Please,Sweden, show your heart.
11:48 September 22, 2012 by gplusa
If they are worried about the cost, send the bill to me.
12:07 September 22, 2012 by occassional
Of course. One out, one (thousand) in, don't rock the boat.
13:03 September 22, 2012 by Svensksmith
Seems unreasonable that the foster mother not be allowed to adopt the young girl.
13:17 September 22, 2012 by Swedish Cat
Agree with the fact that we cannot take everyone in however she is an EU citizen no? Why is it harder for people in the "European Union" to come and live here than someone from the outside? The Afghanistan guy got to stay and he did not even have a foster home?
13:26 September 22, 2012 by jostein
Dura lex, sed lex
14:35 September 22, 2012 by Migga
France is filled with loving foster mothers who will do a just as good a job to raise this girl as any swedish foster mother. One can`t just fall for the emotional arguments.

What will happen if one starts to make exceptions to the law? It starts with a young child, but where does it end? What will happen if the girl gets to stay and then her parents show up? Will she be returned to her parents? Will her parents show up from hiding and try and stay in Sweden? The immigration system is already in shambles.

At the same time it`s sad that young children have to leave while young adults who trick their way into Sweden stays.
14:53 September 22, 2012 by texaslass
jostein:

leges sine moribus vanae
15:58 September 22, 2012 by Morenikeji
This calls for a level-headed solution. The welfare and the future of this child should be paramount. The whereabouts of the child's mother should be first established before either rushing to give her to the foster parents or deport her. It's unfortunate that a young child would be surrounded with this kind of controversy.
17:02 September 22, 2012 by Swedish Cat
@ Migga

Offcourse you are right but as the mother has French citizenship nothing as I could see would stop her to come to Sweden to live anyway?
17:21 September 22, 2012 by Migga
@ Swedish Cat

She could do anything she want`s, nothing has stopped her so far. But if it`s right is another question. The afghan guy didn`t get to stay in Sweden by the way.
18:16 September 22, 2012 by Tiny Red Ant
From the story it seems the child is Swedish. Maybe more detail should be provided to clear up that confusion.

There is a serious problem of stateless children. Not every nation has are signitory to the UN convention that is suppose to prevent that.

This girls situation is sad.
18:54 September 22, 2012 by dizzymoe33
Here in the US the child would be mad a "ward of the State" in which someone could adopt the child more easily, if no parent(s) or relatives could be found.
20:40 September 22, 2012 by Richard Head
Meanwhile, Sweden lets in another 1,000 future rapists and criminals....Migrationsverket will be the death of this country.
20:57 September 22, 2012 by jimmyjames
Heere is the deal, they use sympathy for a child to allow yet another alien into the country. The girl is legally French so therefore it is the responsibility of the French. If the girls birth mother is ever identified she needs to be imprisoned for a minimum for about 10 years, however in a Nordic country if you kill 6-12 people and then rape another dozen or so children you can expect to be imprisoned for , oh 6-12 months. Insanity. The girls father needs to be deported also for neglecting his blood kin. Anyone who would turn their back on their own child isn't worth a cow dung paddy, seriously. I do know that Sweden doesn't start dealing with this massive flood of illegal alieans in 50 years time the Sweden your Grandparents knew, your Parents knew, and you now know will no longer exist and it won't be due to an external invasion but because you lacked the basic common sense to defend your TRIBE, your NATION, your CULTURE, and your HERITAGE with every last ounce of strength and drop of blood you have in your being. If you Swedes are truely that weak then you don't deserve to exist and you sure don't deserve to carry the DNA of those Ancient, Feared, and Respected Warriors who, just the mention of their name made peoples cringe with fear, THE VIKINGS.
21:24 September 22, 2012 by expatjourno
jimmyjames, don't you have an island in Norway to go shoot up? I don't know where you came from, but please go back there. Your racism disgusts me.

Any French person can live in Sweden at any time. The little girl was born in Sweden, which makes her just as Swedish as anyone else. And if she grows up in Sweden, she will grow up with Swedish values.

As for her mother, most likely the people she was fleeing caught up with her and she is dead.
23:29 September 22, 2012 by Richard Head
So now the definition of "racist" extends to people who love and want to preserve their country. Lovely. You pro-Sharia for Europe people really know how to de-value the meaning of a word.
23:31 September 22, 2012 by Swedish Cat
@ expatjourno

I am also wondering why there is a problem as born in Sweden? My Swedish friend had a baby in Canada and the baby was automatically Canadian even though she wasnt.

I am afraid you are right. I also believe she might be dead.
23:58 September 22, 2012 by RobinHood
This seems to be a special case. The authorities need to move heaven and earth to make sure the little girl stays with the Liewehr's where she is settled and wanted.

She was born in Sweden, she's a Swede, and she deserves a break.
00:16 September 23, 2012 by Migga
@ expatjourno, Swedish Cat, RobinHood

Both her parents are french citizens, that makes her a french citizen aswell, even though she was born in Sweden.

In Canada, USA and in the rest of the north and southamerican countries it works differently. They have something called Jus soli which means that the country where a baby is born will give it citizenship. That`S why your friends baby became a canadian citizen.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jus_soli

Not so in Sweden and in most other parts of the world. If this girls dad or mom was a Swede then she would be a swedish citizen. But since her dad is french and her mom aswell she becomes a french citizen. She is not a Swede.

France is more then able to take care of this child.
00:40 September 23, 2012 by DAVID T
@expatjourno

When a foreigners child is born in Sweden the child becomes the citizen of the mothers country - I have 2 children who only where allowed to become Swedish if their mother became a swedish citizen
10:14 September 23, 2012 by jostein
@texaslass

If you disagree with the law, act to change it rather than to corrupt it. When you pit Horace against Burchard (a laughable concept all in itself) you are really declaring for anarchy. No law is infinately worse than bad law. In a territory with no law warlords rule arbitrarily. If he or his henchmen catch a fancy to your daughter, gone! If they catch a fancy to your house, gone! If they dont like you, you die. Noone can create anything since the men of violence will take it from you. How do you think the Taliban came to power in Afghanistan? They represented law, as opposed to the 10-20 years of no law that had reigned before them.

Dura lex, sed lex. Is still all that needs to be said about this issue. And all you people who argue that the law should be ignored in just this instance because you feel so terribly sentimental. You are irresponsible children. Chaos, cruelty, violence and mayhem will be your creation when you succeed in abolishing the rule of law.
11:13 September 23, 2012 by Frobobbles
France is not so bad. It is at least better than Sweden.
19:44 September 23, 2012 by Emerentia
@ Frobobbles So you would rather live in an orphanage in France than with the people who love you and you regard as your parents in Sweden? The people who object to this deportation are not doing this because we think that Sweden is better than France, but because it's cruel to take a little child from the only mother and father she knows and send her to an orphanage in a country she's never been to, where she don't know the language etc.
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