„A group of people are now stand­ing outside a hospi­tal ward at Land­spít­ali, plann­ing to drag the child out of there aga­inst its will with by means necessary. They are going to deli­ver the child to its father, whom it fears and has repeatedly refu­sed any communication with. The Child Protective Services in Reykja­vík, The District Commissioner of Greater Reykja­vík and the police are behind this action. The mother’s lawyer has tried expla­in­ing the child’s situation to no avail.“

This is written in an announcement posted on Facebook by the „Líf án ofbeldis“, or Life Without Violence organization today. Police officer Guð­mundur Pétur Guð­munds­son said in an interview with Mannlíf that the police was at the scene, to aid Child Protective Services in picking up the child.

The announcement states that the child does not want to live with its father and has always counted on being cared for by its mother.

„With this implementation the aut­horities mean to enforce a rul­ing on the child’s legal domicile with its father, aga­inst the child’s will. The father is suspected of long stand­ing mental and physical violence aga­inst the children and their mother. This implementation, aga­inst the child’s will, is without exception going to cause the child great emotional distress.

The child in question is chronically ill and has always been in the primary care of its mother. There is great risk that the child will suffer irrepara­ble damage. We fully condemn this complete lack of reg­ard towards children’s inter­ests, exhi­bited with this implementation, and the govern­ment’s bru­tal conduct towards the victims of violence.“

The announcement carries on, stating that „The child in question is mat­ure enough to be able to express their free will. To ign­ore the child’s wishes is in clear violation of the main rule of children’s rights, according to The United Nations Convention of the Rights of the Child, and Icelandic children’s law on the child’s right to expression. With reg­ards to a child’s constitutional right to family life, The Supreme Court has confirmed that when weighing the best inter­ests of a child, the child’s inter­est and it’s right to privacy and imm­unity, protected by the Icelandic constitution, must always be taken into full consideration.“

This article was orig­inally publ­is­hed in Icelandic by Katrín Heiða Guð­jóns­dóttir.