Mother of Ibrahim Faraj visits foreign office for meeting

Ranem el Khalidi has not seen her son for almost eight months now, with her ex-husband Hamzah Faraj having taken the eight-year-old to his home country of Saudi Arabia last November.

In her continued battle to see the safe return of her child, Ibrahim Faraj, she has arranged a meeting with Foreign Office officials to discuss the plan moving forward.

Ibrahim Faraj (Image: Cheshire Police)

She was joined in her journey to the Foreign Office’s London Headquarters by local MP, Mike Amesbury, who has been supporting her throughout the process.

The meeting follows Mr Amesbury raising the issue in Parliament, after which Foreign Secretary James Cleverly said that a meeting would be arranged.

Ranem reiterated that a big talking point from the meeting had been her desire to get a British passport for Ibrahim.

“I was talking about Ibrahim getting an English passport just because in my political view I think it will be easier to bring him home.

“If you talk with anyone from Saudi Arabia, such as a lawyer or the Saudi Embassy they will be like, "He is a Saudi, he is with his dad in Saudi Arabia, so what do you want?"

“So, if Ibra becomes English officially, it will be different when I speak to them.”

Ranem el Khalidi in London with Mike Amesbury MP (Image: Mike Amesbury)

Ibrahim was born in a hospital in Manchester, has lived here his entire life, and only speaks English.

Due to a legal loophole involving the residential status of Ranem, who is Palestinian, and Hamzah, who is Saudi Arabian, at the time, Ibrahim does not have a British passport.

This fact was something that Ranem said stuck in the mind of MP Mike Amesbury.

“At the meeting, Mike was trying his best. He was like, ‘Ibrahim is just like my son. They were born in the same hospital. So why does he not have a British passport?’”

The eight months have taken a clear toll on the Palestinian mother, who became emotional at multiple points during the interview.

She said: “I've started thinking, what will he look like now? He's a kid and it's been 8 months. Has he changed?

Ranem with Ibrahim (Image: Mike Amesbury)

“I feel like he mentally will be exhausted. He is without his mom without his friends. He doesn’t speak Arabic.

“Maybe at first, he was excited because he was going with his dad.

“I keep thinking about him to be honest, more than about myself, just thinking how is he doing there, is he okay or not?”

When asked what she would say in a message to Ibrahim, Ranem said: “I would just tell him that I love him so much.

“And that if his father was saying that I didn't love him and I don't care, I just hope that he will not believe any of this because I really love him so much.

“I'm going to keep going to bring him home.”

Mike Amesbury, MP for Weaver Vale, said: “It was very important senior Foreign Office officials were able to meet with myself and Ranem, Ibrahim’s mum, so she could hear it ‘as it is’ from the very top.

“We made a plea to exert diplomatic pressure because that’s all we can do given there is no legal arrangement between the UK and Saudi Arabia to enable Ibrahim to be brought home even though he has been unlawfully abducted.

“But there are strong economic and trading ties between our two countries so I will be turning up the volume in my role as Ranem’s constituency MP to ensure the Government makes the most of all the diplomatic channels available.

“The officials were as receptive as they could be given the constraints.

“Ibrahim was born in Manchester, in the same hospital as my son. He’s as British as I am or my son. He needs to be back here with his mum and his school friends, who also miss him dearly.

“The whole community has been impacted by this shocking and heartbreaking episode.

“His mum has started the hashtag #bringibrahome on social media. And that’s exactly what we will endeavour to do.”

Another aspect of the meeting was querying how it was that Ibrahim was able to leave the country.

Just eight days prior to Ibrahim being taken out the country, a court order for custody was issued – specifying that neither parent could take Ibrahim out the country without permission of both parents and the court.

A statement from the Saudi embassy states that Hamzah Faraj contacted them claiming Ibrahim had lost his passport. They issued temporary travel papers and claim to have received ‘a report from the relevant United Kingdom police authority.’

Ranem and Mike Amesbury speaking to BBC Radio 4 (Image: Mike Amesbury)

The Home Office, the relevant United Kingdom authority for issuing papers, refused to comment.

As well as this, there are no checks at airports on outstanding court orders for children.

According to Ranem, this is a massive oversight.

She said: “What’s the point in me going to court and spending all this time waiting for it to be sorted, only for him to take Ibrahim eight days later?

“The court order was a waste of the paper it was printed on.”

As well as being unable to prevent Ibrahim from leaving the country, ongoing legal proceedings relating to the court order meant the media were unable to publicly name Hamzah or Ibrahim for six months following Ibrahim’s abduction.