Activist mother flees Sweden after authorities pursue her child – Middle East Monitor
Zeinab Ltaif, a mother of six, actively participated in protests against Sweden’s social services before she fled the country with her children. A year later, the family, who have lived in four countries since then, are still searching for a place to call home, Anadolu news agency reports.
To talk to Anatolia, Ltaif said she had always seen families being torn apart without legal reasons or evidence. In later times, she started joining the demonstrations after her sister’s child was taken by the authorities. Keeping the issue hot on social media and giving interviews to news channels was almost a daily routine for her.
Ltaif claimed that what most of the families experienced was against both the Swedish and European laws. At the time, she became too vocal to witness accusations of spreading misinformation to the public. Ltaif, a Muslim woman who does not wear a headscarf, said she was shocked to see labels with “extremist, Islamist” next to her name.
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She then started receiving text messages from Swedish social service personnel, where they questioned how she could bring her children to the demonstrations and asked her if she was a responsible mother. Ltaif responded by saying that children also have the right to participate in a peaceful protest and gave them examples from other demonstrations. She said her child received high international media coverage after holding placards in English in central Stockholm.
Shortly afterwards, social services claimed it had received information from an anonymous person that Ltaif was cruel to her children, which she strongly denied, telling authorities that if that had been the case, schools and doctors would have intervened.
Ltaif said she knew they were after her children and decided to move with her husband to another country for a new life in February last year.
“We left our work and went to Turkiye, where my husband has a sister. We stayed there for two or three months. The next move was to Germany. Then we moved to Egypt and now we are in Lebanon. So we haven’t found that a place to live, work and start a new life, from scratch.”
The probe closed when the family leaves Sweden, back again when they return
Once abroad, social services told the family they were dropping their investigation. The family returned to the country three months after their first departure, not knowing they would leave the country again in August, following a second investigation.
In her very first days abroad, Ltaif received a call from social services saying they had a new report saying someone had seen her children playing outside on their own without an adult present.
“Then they said I yelled at my kids before I took them to a demonstration. I told them how this is even possible because my kids aren’t even in the country. They can easily and shamelessly lie to you.”
READ: Palestinian researchers condemn Sweden’s “kidnapping” of Muslim children
Leaving the house they bought behind, the family is still trying to settle into a new life.
Ltaif was a nurse at a hospital and her husband was a mechanic at a Swedish company, and the couple claimed they have no regrets about their decision, having seen how a family can be separated from their children without evidence.
The issue of social services is not something new, Ltaif said, arguing that the laws in place are not bad but they are misused and abused by the authorities.
The investigations are forwarded to a committee, made up of members from different political parties, for a decision to remove the child to a foster family. The administrative court then also looks at the case and that is where the complaints come in from the families. According to the law, only social services lawyers can attend the hearing, not their staff, which is not the case families claim.
By law, the lawyers representing social services are also not supposed to communicate verbally, but only submit their findings to the court, which is again a crime, according to the families. The rules state that any party who does not comply with the points mentioned in the law is “deprived of liberty”. Families say this is why they say the state is “kidnapping” their children, as mentioned in the ordinance.
READ: After Sweden “kidnaps” his five children, the Syrian father seeks help from Turkey’s Erdogan