Once upon a time a happy family

Tuesday, June 26, 2012

Domenic Johansson to be Reunited with Family Atlast!



Domenic Johansson’s case will end up in a good note after all. Talks of reunion with parents are underway since the courts have sided with parents, Christer and Anne, as the unanimous and extensive testimonies given by friends and family spoke of their goodness and love for the child. Domenic was forcibly taken from his parents in 2009 by Swedish government officials saying that his parents were unfit for homeschooling him.

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Swedish Court Rules in Favor of Homeschooling Parents; Family Awaits Son's Return



Ever since Swedish authorities removed 10-year-old Domenic Johansson from his homeschooling parents in 2009, family, friends and both the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF) and the Homeschool Legal Defense Association (HSLDA) have been working to get him back.

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Parents of ‘State-Napped’ Boy Hopeful after Favorable Court Ruling



In a major breakthrough, a Swedish district court has ruled in favor of Christer and Annie Johansson, parents of now ten-year-old Domenic, and has stated that their parental rights will not be terminated. Attorneys with the Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA) and the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF) are legal advisors to the parents, who are represented by Ruby Harrold-Claesson of the Nordic Committee on Human Rights.

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Nightmare soon to end?: Court vindicates Swedish homeschooling parents in state kidnapping case



A Swedish homseschooling couple may shortly be reunited with their son after a prolonged separation, after a Swedish court has judged that the couple did not act irresponsibly by removing their children from the public school system.

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Hope surfaces in case of 'state-napped' child



For the first time in three years, supporters of a boy “state-napped” by Swedish police officers aboard a jet preparing to take off for India say they have hope he will be returned to his parents’ custody.

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Swedish Court Allows Son to Return to Homeschooling Parents



"We encourage Swedish authorities to release Domenic to his parents in light of the court's ruling..." -Roger Kiska, ADF

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Third anniversary of Domenic Johansson’s removal from the plane and his parents



Yesterday, June 25, 2012, was the third anniversary of Domenic Johansson’s removal from the plane on which he and his parents were sitting, waiting to leave Sweden for India to start a new life. Swedish social authorities and the police violated Domenic’s and his family members’ basic human rights guaranteed in the European Convention Additional Protocol 4 Article 2:2, which guarantees: “Everyone is free to leave any country including his own”. Yet they were prevented from leaving Sweden.

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Swedish Court Vindicates Homeschooling Parents



A Swedish district court has ruled that the parental rights of a 10-year-old boy abducted by the government three years ago for being home-schooled will not be terminated. The court stated it could not ignore the unanimous and extensive testimony of firsthand accounts of friends, family and others that Domenic Johansson’s parents, Christer and Annie, were properly caring for him prior to Swedish authorities seizing him in 2009.

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Swedish Court Vindicates Johansson Parents



The parental rights of Christer and Annie Johansson will not be terminated, a Swedish district court ruled. Last week’s ruling comes three years after Domenic Johansson was forcibly abducted from his parents by social services minutes before the family’s departure for India.

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Wednesday, June 13, 2012

Governor urged to take up detention of NRI mother's son



West Bengal Governor M K Narayanan has been urged to take up the alleged detention of an 11-year-old boy in Sweden, months after the boy's mother sought Indian's government's intervention in the matter.

Kolkata-based NGO "India's Smile", which claimed to have brought to light the custody row over the Swedish boy Domenic, similar to the recent NRI couple custody row in Norway, said on Friday it had forwarded to the Governor a copy of a letter from Fam Christer Johansson, father of the boy in Sweden, for his intervention.

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From Sweden Without Love: Domenic Johansson, Homeschooling, Mother India and the Swedish Gulag



The following article was prepared at the request of the Indian National Newspaper, Pravasi Today and covers the Domenic Johansson child abduction case in Sweden.

In what is being described by some as the Swedish Government's biggest blunder in modern times, a little half-Swedish, half-Indian boy called Domenic Johansson is standing in the middle of a political tsunami that threatens to rip apart the myth of the 'Swedish Utopia' and expose the Scandinavian régime as one of the worst and most systematic violators of human rights in Western Europe.

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To whom do children belong - their parents or the state?



I don’t pretend to know the rights and wrongs of Sweden’s Domenic Johansson case, and here’s a link to an article which doesn’t pretend to be objective, but I do know that when I google the case I can’t find anything on the other side. What apparently happened was that almost two years ago the Swedish government swooped down on the Johansson family and seized their then-seven-year-old son Domenic because he was being homeschooled. And the Swedish government still won’t give him back to his parents.

I’m pretty sure most people will agree that the only reasonable grounds for separating a young child from his or her parents is neglect or abuse - which homeschooling clearly isn’t. According to the linked-to article, however, the Swedish government’s actions are a manifestation of its adherence to the Platonic philosophy whereby children are the property of the state and their education is the responsibility of the state. The Platonic view is in sharp contrast to the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights, with its Article 30, Clause 3 declaration: “Parents have a prior right to choose the kind of education that shall be given to their children”.

So which approach is better? Or can there be a middle ground? If so, what is it? H/T AMP

Source

Govt looking into Domenic Johansson’s Swedish custody



After over a month’s efforts by a local NGO for the release of an NRI mother’s son from the custody of Swedish authorities in Gotland, the Indian external affairs ministry has said it is now looking into the matter, including the legal aspects.

The incident came to light after Fam Christer Johansson and his NRI wife Annie Johansson (Nirmal Kumar Bharos) wrote to a city-based NGO India’s Smile that their 11-year-old son Domenic has been taken into custody by the child welfare services of the European nation in 2009.

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