Here There and Everywhere

A British mother, who has been fighting a custody battle for her son with her late husband’s Qatari family, was on Monday briefly reunited with the boy for the second time, Bahrain’s Gulf Daily News yesterday said.

Rebecca Jones claims her son Adam has been “kidnapped” by the Qatari relatives. She saw him for the first time last Thursday, after the Cassation Court in Doha agreed to let her visit him.

“It was a bit better tonight, still very upsetting. I brought Adam some presents and he seemed happy with that,” Bahrain resident Jones told the GDN.

“He keeps telling me he wants to come home with me so it’s really terrible. It’s difficult to leave him, he was very tearful tonight when I left but I get to see him twice a week now. I will be back to see him in two days. I think that has made it easier for both of us.

“I told Adam I’d bring some movies next time and we can just pretend we are back in Bahrain, just the two of us.

“He spoke to his friends tonight. He hasn’t spoken to them since he left Bahrain. Some of them were upset. He also spoke to his grandmother and Barrie (stepfather) and Alex (younger sister),” Jones said.

“I’m desperate to see my son. I wouldn’t care if it was even for one hour at this stage. He said he’s very bored and has got nothing to do during the day, he just plays the Playstation from morning to night. He said he can’t sleep at all,” GDN quoted her as saying.

“He knows I love him and he knows I’m not going to leave him until we can go back to Bahrain together and get back to our lives.

“I’m going to keep going until I can go to a judge and get my son back. I’m waiting for the day when they have to let him go.”

Jones claims Adam was abducted on October 3 after she was “duped into travelling with him to visit his sick Qatari grandmother.”

Meanwhile, Bahrain Human Rights Watch Society secretary-general Faisal Fulad, who has been central to the campaign to bring Adam home, is in London to meet British
non-governmental organisations.

“I have been making contacts with Amnesty International, Save the Children and the children’s rights committee in British Parliament. I hope to meet them for discussions tomorrow,” he told the GDN.

“I am also trying to get a hold of people in BBC, Sky News and some big British newspapers because we need to generate more awareness, more media coverage and more support for Adam’s campaign.”

A Facebook group demanding Adam be reunited with his family in Bahrain, meanwhile, has attracted more than 7,000 members in almost four weeks.

Those who set up the group has organised a sponsored swim at St Christopher’s Senior School in Isa Town, and raised about BD1,000 for the campaign.

Divorced from Rebecca Jones for a number of years, Adam’s Qatari father, Jamal al-Madhaiki, died in 2005. Adam had remained in Bahrain with his mother, stepfather and younger sister until he and his mother travelled to Qatar.

Jones claims that in Qatar, her late ex-husband’s family requested her to sign some documents relating to what they said was Adam’s inheritance.

According to Jones, the papers in Arabic turned out to be custody documents in the name of Adam’s grandmother.