13. The above-mentioned statement was reiterated in Re R
(Minors) (Wardship: Jurisdiction) [(1981) 2 FLR 416 (CA)]. Ormrod
LJ said:
“It follows that the strength of an application for a summary order
for the return of the child to the country from which it has been
removed, must rest, not on the so-called “kidnapping” of the child,
or an order of a foreign court, but on the assessment of the best
interests of the child. Both, or either, are relevant considerations,
but the weight to be given to either of them must be measured in
terms of the interests of the child, not in terms of penalizing the
„kidnapper‟, or of comity, or any other abstraction. „Kidnapping‟,
like other kinds of unilateral action in relation to children, is to be
strongly discouraged, but the discouragement must take the form
of a swift, realistic and unsentimental assessment of the best
interests of the child, leading, in proper cases, to the prompt return
of the child to his or her own country, but not the sacrifice of the
child's welfare to some other principle of law.”
Part Of Judgment
Lahore High Court
Criminal Proceedings
74048/19
2020 LHC 1172
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