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 Post subject: The Strand Lobben case against Norway in Strasbourg
PostPosted: Thu Nov 30, 2017 4:06 am 
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Judgment in case against Norway coming up in the Strasbourg Court

On The European Court of Human Rights' website, it says in the file of Forthcoming Jugments and decisions 28-30.11.17 that the following case is due on 30 November 2017:

*****

Strand Lobben and Others v. Norway (no. 37283/13)

The case concerns the removal of a mother’s parental authority and the adoption of her eldest son.

The applicants are T. Strand Lobben, born in 1986, her children X and Y, and her parents, S. Graff Lobben and L. Lobben. They are Norwegian.

T. Strand Lobben’s first son was born in September 2008. Having experienced difficulties when she was pregnant, she had turned to the child welfare authorities for guidance and accepted to stay at a family centre for evaluation during the first months after the child was born. However, a month after the birth she decided to leave the centre. The authorities decided to take the baby into immediate compulsory care and place him in a foster home on an emergency basis as the centre’s staff had concerns about whether the baby had been receiving enough food to survive. The baby remained in foster care for the next three years until the social welfare authorities authorised the foster parents to adopt him in December 2011.

As concerned the foster care, the domestic authorities decided that it would not be in the baby’s best interests to discontinue public care given his special care needs and the fundamental limitations in the mother’s parenting skills.

As concerned the subsequent decision to remove the mother’s parental authority and to authorise the adoption, the case was first decided in 2011 by the County Social Welfare board, comprised of a jurist, a psychologist and a layperson who heard 21 witnesses over three days. The mother was present and represented by counsel. The Board concluded that adoption would be in the baby’s best interest.

The mother appealed this decision before the courts in 2012. She was again present and represented during three days of witnesses being heard by a professional judge, psychologist and lay person. However, while the courts found that her situation had improved in some areas – she had married and had another child in 2011 – she had not shown improvement in empathising with or understanding her son who was psychologically vulnerable and, as found in a psychiatric report, was in need of a lot of quiet, security and support. The courts notably took account of the contact sessions over three years during which the child had not bonded psychologically with his biological mother and had even been “inconsolable” afterwards, and the security that his fosters parents, whom he regarded as his parents, could provide in the years ahead.

Relying on Article 8 (right to respect for private and family life), the applicants complain about the domestic authorities’ decision to let the foster parents adopt X. They allege in particular that severing family ties should only be ordered in exceptional circumstances, such as a particularly unfit family, and that it was not enough to show that a child would have a more beneficial environment if brought up elsewhere.

*****


The Norwegian state's arguments about bonding and vulnerability are among the psychobabble terms most in use at the moment. The boy being "iconsolable" after meeting with his mother and this being "interpreted" as a sign that he has not bonded with her, is not understandable at all – inconsolable about what? The confusing content may be due to an inadequate formulation from the Court but may at least equally well be the kind of nonsense the CPS practices.

  

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 Post subject: Re: Judgment in case against Norway coming in Strasbourg
PostPosted: Fri Dec 01, 2017 9:24 am 
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The state won. That was only to be expected, actually. There was a dissent, though: four judges for the state, three dissenting.

The Norwegian judge in Strasbourg, Erik Møse, was of course on the winning side, in favour of the state – all formal procedures have been followed, everything is correct! What a revealing example of Norwegian justice: all form and no humane content. No understanding of the actually scientific, solid facts of family feelings and their importance either, just this ridiculous belief in our misguided "child experts" and the "excellence" of our judicial system.

And three other judges in Strasbourg buy this nonsense: Nussberger (Germany), Potocki (France), Kucsko-Stadlmayer (Austria).

*

A possible, good thing about the opinions expressed by the winning majority here: Foreigners who see some atrocious CPS cases in Norway, e.g affecting their own citizens living in Norway, tend to think that Norway can't really mean its child protection services to carry on in this way, and that they only have to explain to Norwegian authorities and then Norwegian authorities will put it right. They are very surprised that Norway's answer is to lecture them about "the Norwegian system". In a sense, the expectation of these delegations and others from abroad is just as ignorant and naïve as the way Norway always is surprised that the foreigners "do not understand", that they themselves "do not get through to the foreigners' understanding" with the official information about "how advanced and good Norwegian CPS is".
    All these foreigners should read the present Strasbourg judgment. Perhaps that will give them a start at understanding how badly placed Norwegian children and their whole families are, under the in many ways superficial, pleasant living here.

*

The dissension of three judges should be studied. They are Grozev (Bulgaria), O'Leary (Ireland), and Hüseynov (Azerbaijan). There, at least, one gets some sense of the actual content of human rights being important.

Case of Strand Lobben and others v. Norway
Hudoc, 30 November 2017


*

A first reaction in the Norwegian press (more sensible than could be expected from Dagbladet):

Norsk dom i Den europeiske menneskerettsdomstol (EMD):
Tvangsadopsjon fratok familien all kontakt med gutten. Nå er Norge frikjent i EMD
Mor og besteforeldre tapte barnevernssak i Strasbourg.
( Norwegian judgment at The European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR):
Forced adoption took all contact with the boy away from the family. Now Norway has been exonerated in the ECtHR
Mother and grandparents lost child protection case in Strasbourg )
Dagbladet, 30 November 2017

  

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 Post subject: Re: Judgment in case against Norway coming in Strasbourg
PostPosted: Thu Jan 04, 2018 10:55 pm 
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A Norwegian professor of political science Marit Skivenes and her co-worker Amy McEwan-Strand have written an article commenting the Strasbourg-verdict in the Strand and Lobben v. Norway - case.

A Child-Centred Court of Human Rights? Strand Lobben v. Norway (30. Nov. 2017)
https://strasbourgobservers.com/2018/01 ... -nov-2017/


I would like to comment on some of the statements in the article.

"The Norwegian word for child protection, “barnevern” is now a term associated with draconian interventions into the family sphere in certain European circuits.

The paradox is that Norway is considered to have a good child protection system when compared to other States’ systems,[1] and Norway is ranked second both on the KidsRight Index[2] and on the UNICEF´s child well-being index in rich countries (2013).[3]"


No, the paradox is rather that a country with very high scores of child well-being still has a need of very high interventions by the CPS. Public statistics also expose the disturbing fact that children in public care do not at all contribute to the high well-being scores.

"During their stay at the care unit, the mother needed to be consistently reminded to feed the baby; she showed a lack of understanding of her son’s needs and empathy towards him; and was deemed herself to be vulnerable and in need of care."

This statement is presented as a fact, without any criticism. The headline itself is "Facts". However, it must be recognized that these are statements made by mother-child homes which can be regarded as an extended branch of the CPS itself. Parents who attend these homes are surveilled 24/7, they are under immense pressure as they know the risk of a negative outcome is extremely high. Many parents are there against their own will, but forced by a direct threat from the CPS to remove their child, or as a decision made by the County Board. Voices have raised strong concerns about the ethics - or lack of such - surrounding these homes.

A simple analysis of the statement quoted here will conclude that these are subjective views, and not hard-hitting facts, of a mother's capabilities as a mother under extreme stress. There is actually nothing in this statement determining the mother`s abilities as a parent. But there is plenty revealing how the observing staff regard her as a mother. Those are two very different things, but regrettably the personal views of staff or CPS workers are usually taken as facts by courts and county boards.

"The reasoning of the Court seems markedly child-centric, placing the child’s best interest before any other interests in the case. "

This statement takes for granted that children and parents have different and opposing interests. Western culture and understanding of the human identity places the child in its own entity. The child is seen as an individual isolated from the family. In contrast, other cultures look at the family as the entity. In parts of Africa, "ubuntu" is the characteristic of humanity. The being of a person is in the fellowship. The family is the core of this togetherness, with its own autonomy.

This statement also leaves out the fact that there are many third parties of interest in CPS cases. Child welfare has indeed grown into a big industry, and commercial interests are deeply involved, from big investors to the individual foster units. Many factors are pushing the process in a definite direction, and the forces involved are surely not only concerned around the child`s welfare. The notion that the child`s interest is the only aspect in these cases is fiction indeed. Regrettably, the systems created to protect children have dynamics that often go against keeping or helping the family.

"When states take a strong responsibility for children´s rights, there will be potential for stronger conflicts and more tensions around the child protection system. We believe this explanation sheds light on the apparent legitimacy problems of the child protection systems in Norway and other countries – and the criticism they are currently under."

The authors are university professionals. Nevertheless, they reveal their stand on the norwegian CPS fairly openly. There is a strong - almost good versus evil - moral judgement in this, and an implied claim that the great controversy around the actions of the CPS has to do with the government taking more responsibility of childrens`rights. They see tensions and conflicts around the CPS in Norway solely as a result of a stronger emphasis on childrens rights,- and seem to view adoption as a good alternative to what was supposed to be temporary foster-care.

But the child also has a right to it's family.

As already mentioned, this article does not touch into the fact that the results of CPS-interventions are disastrous. Nor does it discuss the fact that the forced adoption-policy with early intervention - often based on fragile predictions of the future - can also be seen as a desperate attempt to produce results in a booming industry where the only positive markers so far are in the budgets of the profit-makers.


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 Post subject: Re: Judgment in case against Norway coming in Strasbourg
PostPosted: Wed Apr 11, 2018 10:05 am 
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The Lobben case has been admitted to Grand Chamber at the European Court of Human Rights


Norsk barnevernssak skal opp til ny behandling i Strasbourg (Norwegian child protection case will be admitted to new treatment in Strasbourg)
Nettavisen (NTB), 10 April 2018

Norsk barnevernsak fikk anke til EMDs storkammer (Appeal to the ECtHR's Grand Chamber was allowed in a Norwegian child protection case)
I høst ble Norge frifunnet i EMD, men nå er en anke over dommen sluppet inn til EMDs egen ankeinstans – storkammeret. Dermed blir det full ny behandling.
(Last autumn Norway was found not guilty in the ECtHR, but now an appeal of the judgment has been admitted to the CDtHR's own appeal court – the Grand Chamber. Therefore, there will be a full new treatment of the case.)
Rett24, 11 April 2018

Probably one reason why the appeal is taken up is that the vote in the (primary) court in Strasbourg was 4 – 3, in other words a sizeable minority against the Norwegian state: Azerbaijan, Bulagaria and Ireland.

This is obviously the Lobben case. Norwegian journalists and editors continue their suppression of the names of the victims. They ought to be spanked! – Oh no, I forgot that spanking of children is strictly forbidden in Norway, and these obedient state defenders are in reality irresponsible children.
    It is in the best interest of NO child that it is kept hidden that the Norwegian state has oppressed, harassed, often tortured the child's parents, while the parents fight on for them to be reunited!
    The name of the mother in this case is Trude Lobben, and she has nothing to be ashamed of, on the contrary!

Hee is a fine video which agrippa has linked to in another thread. Rune Fardal interviews Marius Reikerås and Trude Lobben, when the decision about taking the case up in Grand Chamber had "ticked in":

"Intervju med Trude Lobben og menneskerettsjurist Marius Reikerås rett etter at de mottok den gledelige meldingen fra Strasbourg."

Reikerås says in the interview that there is only about a 3% chance of getting a case admitted to the ECtHR at all. Getting it admitted to the Grand Chamber after a first verdict only happens in about 1 per cent of those cases (usually a state which has lost the case in the first instance, will appeal to the Grand Chamber), and as far as he knows, nobody at all except Trude Lobben, having lost against the state in the first instance, has succeeded in having their appeal accepted for a new trial in the Grand Chamber.

    

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 Post subject: Re: Judgment in case against Norway coming in Strasbourg
PostPosted: Tue Sep 11, 2018 5:27 pm 
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The forced adoption case of Strand Lobben and Others v. Norway comes up before the Grand Chamber of the Court of Human Rights
on 17 October 2018


Cases pending before the Grand Chamber
European Court of Human Rights

  

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 Post subject: Re: The Strand Lobben case against Norway in Strasbourg
PostPosted: Wed Oct 17, 2018 11:58 pm 
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The case was up before the Grand Chamber today, 17 October 2018. There will hopefully be articles in English when the judgment comes.

A video of the hearing should be available tomorrow the 18th:
Strand Lobben and Others v. Norway (no. 37283/13)
European Court of Human Rights, 17 October 2018


Articles in Norwegian are linked to here:
Tvangsadopsjon i Den europeiske menneskerettighetsdomstolen


  

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 Post subject: Re: The Strand Lobben case against Norway in Strasbourg
PostPosted: Fri Oct 19, 2018 7:22 am 
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Video in English:

Rune Fardal:
Some reflections on human rights in the light of the ECHR Grand Chamber hearing in Lobben case, 17. oktober 2018.
Rune Fardal in talk with Marius Reikerås in Strasbourg.
Family Channel – Focus on Family & Human Rights in Norway, on facebook, 19 October 2018

  

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 Post subject: Re: The Strand Lobben case against Norway in Strasbourg
PostPosted: Sat Oct 20, 2018 6:55 am 
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Norway child services in European court for removing children from parents without good reason
LifeSite, 17 October 2018

"STRASBOURG, France, October 17, 2018 (LifeSiteNews) – The Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) in Strasbourg will hear today the case of Strand Lobben v. Norway."

"In April 2018, in a landmark decision, the Grand Chamber panel of five judges in the ECHR decided to refer the case to the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights. This followed an earlier December 2017 ECHR judgment stating no human rights had been violated. This judgment was hailed as a validation for the Norwegian system of intervention with families."

"This officious intervention by the Norwegian state is, however, just one example of many that have caused concerns for families living in Norway, and for many looking on from abroad."

"Central to these cases is the Norwegian child protection agency, Barnevernet. The Norwegian Child Welfare Services (Norwegian: Barnevernet, literally "child protection") are the public agencies responsible for child welfare services in Norway. This ECHR case involving Norway comes after a recent report by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) into the practices of Barnevernet."

"Laurence Wilkinson, Legal Counsel for ADF International ..... : "The investigation into Norway has shown that without effective safeguards, child protection agencies can cause long-term damage to families and undermine the prior right that parents have to raise their children according to international law. It is very encouraging to see the Council of Europe highlight the importance of keeping families together.” " 


  

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 Post subject: Re: The Strand Lobben case against Norway in Strasbourg
PostPosted: Sat Oct 20, 2018 7:21 am 
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(Marius Reikerås writes on facebook that he wants people's help in sharing this information. I have therefore printed it in full.
The translations are mine. MHS)



Marius Reikerås:
Har dommerne Ravarani(Luxembourg), Spano (Island) og Pere Pastor Vilanova(Andorra), bidratt til å avsløre den gedigne norske menneskerettsbløffen som Lobben (og mange andre) ble og blir utsatt for?
(Have judges Ravarani (Luxembourg), Spano (Iceland) and Pere Pastor Vilanova (Andorra) contributed to exposing the giant Norwegian human rights bluff which Lobben (and many others) have been the victims of?)
Marius Reikerås, on facebook, 19 October 2018


Jeg tror svaret er ja.
(I think the answer is yes.)


1. Ravarani stiller et meget enkelt spørsmål til staten:
Hva skjedde med jordmoren, som støttet Lobben med tanke på å få barnet sitt tilbake?
(Ravarani puts a very simple question to the state.
What happened to the midwife who supported Lobben with a view to getting her child back?)

Svaret ligger i dagen:
Hun ble selvsagt "fjernet " fra saken, da hun ble oppfattet som brysom for det offentlige.
Lobben privatengsjerte psykolog, ble heller ikke vektlagt.
(The answer is obvious:
She was of course "taken off" the case, since she was considered troublesome for the authorities.
Lobben's privately engaged psychologist was not paid attention to either.)

Dette er jo ikke noe nytt.
Vi har talløse eksempler på at de som støtter den private part i kampen mot det offentlige i Norge, blir diskreditert, trakassert eller sogar bare "forsvinner".
(There is nothing new in this.
We have countless examples of people who support the private party in the fight against official Norway being discredited, harassed, or even just "disappearing".)



2. Dommer Pere Pastor Vilanova, lurer på hvordan babyen til Trudy Lobben ble tatt fra henne i 2008.
(Judge Pere Pastor Vilanova wonders about the procedure when Trude Lobben's baby was taken from her in 2008.)
Svaret er på mest mulig brutalt vis.
Noen ansatte på mødrehjemmet "Vilde" kom, uten forvarsel, og hentet babyen .
Og sa til Trude at hun fikk pakke sakene sine og dra derfra.
(The answer is: In the most brutal of ways.
Some employees in the mothers' home "Vilde" came, without forewarning, and took the baby.
And said to Trude that she should pack her things and leave.)

Selvsagt visste de da, allerede i 2008, at gutten aldri ville komme tilbake til henne.
Så i realiteten ble gutten bortadoptert allerede i 2008.
At adopsjonsvedtaket kom i 2012, er ikke noe annet enn statlig maskepi, for noe som var avklart allerede i 2008.
(Of course they knew, then already in 2008, that the boy would never come back to her.
So in reality the boy was adopted away in 2008 already.
That the decision of adoption came in 2012 is nothing but the state's collusion, regarding something which had been decided as early as in 2008.)

Ikke glem Asle Hansen nylige artikkel i Dagbladet, der han avslører tette bånd mellom fostermor og barnevernssjefen, allerede i 2010.
(Do not forget Asle Hansen's recent article in Dagbladet, in which he exposes the close ties between the foster mother and the head of the child protection office, as early as in 2010.)


3. Så til spørsmålene fra dommer Spano.
Han avslører jo at det ikke hadde noe å si at Lobben i 2012 hadde giftet seg og fått et nytt barn.
Det vektla ikke Drammen tingrett i det hele tatt, da retten åpenbart sier at tilbakeføring ikke er aktuelt.
(Now to judge Spano's questions.
He exposes that it did not indeed matter that Lobben had married in 2012 and had had another child.
Drammen District Court did not consider it important at all, since they clearly say that a return of the child is not to be thought of.)

Videre, og det vet vi fra før: ingen i det norske systemet var villig til å se på Lobbens menneskeretter.
(Furthermore – and we know this already: Nobody in the Norwegian system was willing to look to Lobben's human rights.)
Er det rart at i Regjeringsadvokaten febrilsk prøver å be Den Europeiske Menneskerettsdomstolen "ligge unna"?
Han vet jo,og det vet vi andre også,at den gedigne norske menneskerettsbløffen er avslørt.
(Is it any wonder that the Attorney General of the Norwegian State is trying feverishly to ask the European Court of Human Rights to "keep away"?
He knows, and the rest of us know too, that the gigantic Norwegian human rights bluff has been revealed.)


En stor takk til de nevnte dommere.
(A heartfelt thanks to the three judges.)

  

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 Post subject: Re: The Strand Lobben case against Norway in Strasbourg
PostPosted: Sun Oct 28, 2018 1:01 pm 
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Lobben-saken: Storkammerhøringen er langt ifra ferdig!
(The hearing in the Grand Chamber is far from over!)
Mediaportalen Usensurert, 28 October 2018

"Parter har mulighet til å ettersende kommentarer til saker som har vært oppe i Kammeret. Dette fremkom da Regjeringsadvokaten bemerket at han ville ettersende dokumenter om nødvendig."
(Regarding cases which have been up before the Chamber, the parties have the possibility of forwarding comments. This was made clear when the government's legal counsel / the Attorney General remarked that he would be forwarding documents if necessary.)

"I flere år har Mediaportalen skrevet om Vilde Barn- og familiesenter der vi har fremlagt et stort antall bevis til våre lesere der vi påpeker at senteret ikke driver etter loven, og heller ikke er et hjelpetiltak slik de hevder."
(For a number of years Mediaportalen has written about Vilde Barn- og familiesenter (Vilde Child and Family center) and has given our readers a number of proofs in which we point out that the center's activity is not according to the law, nor is it an assistance measure in the way claimed.)

It is not clear to me (MHS) what it implies to say that Mediaportalen has pointed out something in proofs they have given. The normal thing would surely be to keep proofs apart from what the supplier of the proofs says or points out about them?


"Oppfølgeren til Asbjørnsen og Mo[e] er Regjeringen & Co:
Det er ikke påstander rundt senteret vi nå sender herfra Mediaportalen, men fakta med skriftlige bevis hentet ut fra offentlig postjournal samt en oppsummering av alle rapportene deres som vi er i besittelse av.
    Skal det endelig få komme til sin rett etter alt arbeidet vi har lagt ned for å få belyst sannheten om Vilde Barn- og familiesenter?

(The follow-up/successor to Asbjørnsen and Moe [extremely well-known collection of Norwegian fairy tales / folk tales] is the Government & Co
What we now forward from Mediaportalen is not only allegations around the center, but facts with written evidence, taken from official postal record(s) plus a summing-up of all of their reports in our possession.
    Is it at long last going to prove its worth, after all the work we have put into exposing the truth about vilde Barn- og familiesenter?)


Forventer at det nå får Regjeringsadvokat Fredrik Sejersted til å tenke seg godt om heretter når han gulper opp med noe som han i hovedsak ikke har peiling på."
([We] expect that this will now make the Attorney General Fredrik Sejersted think seriously from now on, when he throws up something he has no real idea of.)

  

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 Post subject: Re: The Strand Lobben case against Norway in Strasbourg
PostPosted: Sun Nov 04, 2018 7:38 am 
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This is practically the best article I have seen about both the Lobben case in the ECtHR and about the state of Norwegian child protection at present. The article has a very wide and far-reaching perspective, and it is right, all of it. And Gundersen's conclusions are right, all of them. 


Fridtjof P Gundersen, lawyer:
Mange av oss er faktisk ganske dumme og slemme når vi får makt
(Many of us are in fact quite stupid and nasty when we are given power)
Når morens barnevernssak blir gitt ny behandling i Strasbourg, skyldes det nok en ulmende følelse av urettferdighet, vilkårlighet og myndighetsmisbruk.
(When the mother's child protection case is given new consideration in Strasbourg, it is, to be sure, because of a smouldering feeling of injustice, arbitrariness and the authorities' abuse of power)
Dagbladet, 31 October 2018

"Moren, som fikk sitt første barn tvangsadoptert, reiser seg verdig foran dommerne som skal avgjøre om Norge brøt Den europeiske menneskerettskonvensjonen (EMK). Med seg har hun en fransk advokat og bilder av seg og barna. Noen meter bortenfor står Fredrik Sejersted, regjeringsadvokaten. Han har ingen klient med seg, men et kobbel av godt utseende unge rådgivere. Alle med trygg oppvekst og gode karakterer.
    De vil aldri komme til å dele morens erfaring; at barnevernet kom og rev hennes tre uker gamle sønn ut av armene hennes."

(The mother, whose first child was forcibly adopted away, gets up in a dignified way, before the judges who are to decide whether Norway violated the European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR). With her she has a French lawyer, and pictures of herself and the children. Some feet away is Fredrik Sejersted, the Attorney General of the Norwegian state. He has no client with him, but a bunch of attractive-looking young advisors. Alle of them with a safe childhood and fine academic results.
    They will never share the mother's experience: that the child protection employees came and tore her three weeks old son out of her arms.)


"Morens sak er én av ni – 9! – norske barnevernssaker som for tiden behandles i EMD. Det er i seg selv ekstremt, spesielt for en såkalt menneskerettighetsnasjon. Ingen land har opplevd noe liknende.
    Enda mer ekstremt er det at Høyesterett bare har behandlet én av sakene. Møse og hans kolleger har abdisert og gjort EMD til den reelle ankedomstol i barnevernssaker. Utover at det er et svik mot de barn og foreldre det gjelder, er det illojalt mot Den europeiske menneskerettskonvensjon, som forutsetter at spørsmål om brudd på konvensjonen behandles nasjonalt. Vi snakker om et rettslig sammenbrudd."

(The mother's case is one out of nine – 9! – Norwegian child protection cases which at present are processed by the ECtHR. That in itself is extreme, especially for a so-called human rights nation. No other country has had the same experience.
    Still more extreme is that our Supreme Court has only taken one of the cases up for consideration. Møse and his colleagues have abdicated and made the ECtHR the real appeal court in child protection cases. In addition to being a betrayal of the children and parents concerned, it is disloyal to the European Convention on Human Rights, which presupposes that questions of violation of the convention are considered nationally. We are talking of judicial collapse.)


It is worth taking special notice of what Gundersen says here about our Supreme Court. In Norway, victims of child protection abuses often believe that the Supreme Court will go to the heart of the matter. But when we consider the actual practice of the Supreme Court, and the way appointments to the Supreme Court are quite politically motivated, there is, on the contrary, reason to conclude that the Supreme Court is our worst court instance of all in child protection cases and other child-related cases.

*

The ominous development we have seen in Norway also exists and has made itself felt, in the ECtHR:

"Mindretallet i første runde i saken har gjort det klart at om frifinnelsen av Norge blir stående, vil det ikke lenger være sammenheng mellom liv og lære i EMD, slik at folk blir lurt til å tro at de har et vern de ikke har. Da vil EMD ha kommet dit Norge lenge har vært."
(The dissenting judges in the first round of the case have made it clear that if the exoneration of Norway is allowed to stand, there will no longer be any connection between principle and practice in the ECtHR, so that people are led to believe they have a protection they do not have. The ECtHR will then have arrived to the place where Norway has been for a long time.)

"Politikerne, psykologene og juristene har oversett at noen skal avgjøre hva som til enhver tid er til barnets beste i tusenvis av konkrete saker. I Norge er det barnevernet, spredt utover landets mange kommuner og bemannet av lavtlønnede kvinner med en billig utdannelse."
(The politicians, the psychologists and the jurists have not taken note of the fact that somebody is to decide what is in the best interest of the child at every point, in thousands of concrete cases. In Norway, the CPS Barnevernet is this instance, spread over the country's many municipalities and manned with low-salary women with a cheap education.)

Indeed yes, it is important to punch a hole in the myth of "the best interest of the child". One finds the concept, the way it is used by the supporters of Barnevernet in Norway, to be empty of content. The supporters do not even make an attempt to define it. Even so, Barnevernet and our authorities are allowed, around the year, to preach sermons about how they attend to "the child's best interest", without anyone demanding the very least explanation of what in the CPS's treatment of children and parents is good for children. As lawyer Gundersen says: judicial collapse.

*

"Morens sak er en typisk norsk barnevernssak. Hun ba selv barnevernet om hjelp. Med det nyfødte barnet ble hun plassert på et familiesenter. I strid med jordmorens vurderinger, anbefalte senteret akuttplassering av hennes sønn."
(The mother's case is a typical Norwegian child protection case. She herself asked the CPS for help. With her newborn child she was placed in a family centre. Contrary to the midwife's assessments, the centre recommented emergency placement of her son.)

'Family centres' and 'mothers' homes' are among the facilities that have to be closed down altogether. It is well-known that they practice 'evaluations' which are unfounded psycho-babble. Such a facility would never be re-engaged by Barnevernet if it did not cough up these 'evaluations' which are to Barnevernet's liking.

*

"Åtti prosent av omsorgsovertakelser starter med akuttvedtak og over halvparten begrunnes med mangler ved den følelsesmessige omsorg. Slike mangler er det stort sett bare et presteskap av psykologer og barnevernsansatte som kan se."
(80 per cent of takings-into-care start with emergency takeovers and more than half of them are claimed to be because of deficiencies in the emotional care. Such deficiencies are usually only observable by a priesthood of psychologists and CPS employees.)

*

"Da det viste seg at moren var godt i stand til å ta seg av barn, ble hennes krav om tilbakeføring avvist med at sønnen har «særlige behov» som bare ekstra kompetente fosterforeldrene kan dekke. Det ble aldri redegjort for guttens spesielle behov. Også dette er typisk.
    Regjeringsadvokatens prosedyre reflekterte myndighetsklimaet i barnevernssaker. Han anklaget moren for ikke å ha etablert tilknytning til gutten gjennom samværene. Med fire korte samvær i året med barnevernsfolk og fostermor hengende over seg, er det selvsagt ikke mulig å etablere noe som helst. Dette argumentet framsto som grusomt og uredelig, men er dessverre typisk."

(When it turned out that the mother was very well able to take care of her child, her demand for return was rejected with claims that the boy had "special needs" which only extra competent foster parents could meet. It was never explained what these special needs were. This too is typical.
    The Attorney General's process reflected what the climate in child protection cases is like with our authorities. He accused the mother of not having established any attachment to the boy through the visitations. With four short visitations per year, with child protection people and the foster mother hanging over them, it is of course not possible to establish anything at all. This argument had the character of being cruel and dishonest, but is, unfortunately, typical.)


*

"Videre poengterte Sejersted at plassering i barnets familie ikke var mulig fordi far er ukjent. Han valgte altså å klandre henne for at hun var alenemor. Et gufs fra femtitallet. Er det slik regjeringen ønsker å bli presentert i Europa?"
(Sejersted went on to make a point out of placement in the child's family not being possible because the father was unknown. So he chose to blame the mother for being a single mother. A very unpleasant reminder from the 1950s. Is this how our government wants to be presented in Europe?)

This is it in a number of child protection cases. Single mothers are easy for the CPS to attack and have the children removed from. That is why they attack them, maybe more frequently than they attack others.

*

"Norske myndigheters barnesentrerte perspektiv er i virkeligheten en revolusjonær ideologi. I den gode hensikts navn («barnets beste») gis en dårlig utrustet forvaltning nærmest uinnskrenket makt. Den siste sperren var EMDs klare rettslige utgangspunkt om at det er til barnas beste å være hos sine foreldre eller i det minste opprettholde bånd til dem.
    Det er dette Norge angriper i denne saken. Og det er derfor den er så viktig. Uten sperrer for myndighetenes inngrep i livene våre står bare den nakne og vilkårlige makt tilbake. Moren gjør en viktig og modig jobb for oss alle."

(The child-centred perspective of Norwegian authorities is in reality a revolutionary ideology. In the name of good intentions ("the child's best interest") a badly equipped administration / civil service is given practically unlimited power. The last barrier was the ECtHR's clear, judicial basis of it being in children's best interest to be with their parents or at least to maintain bonds to them.
    This is what Norway is attacking in this case. And that is why it is so important. With no barriers against the encroachment of the authorities on our lives, only naked and haphazard power remains. The mother is doing an important and courageous job for all of us.)


The question remains, though, how the ECtHR will in the coming Grand Chamber judgment motivate upholding the principle, if they do uphold it. Without a basis in available documentation of why it is important for children to maintain the bonds to their own parents, it is left to feelings, sundry reasoning and sundry connections that judges and Council of Europe members may see, whether the principle of upholding the bonds is made to rest on a basis of facts. If not, it may again come under attack at any time. Scientific documentation exists. So far, it has not been made the centre of argumentation in any country's deliberations of children's best interest.


**

Cf also

Marianne Haslev Skånland: How Norwegian experts came to reject biological kinship as relevant in child welfare policy

Siv Westerberg:The Folly of Sweden's State Controlled Families

many of the references in English here:
Sverre Kvilhaug: Atskillelse barn og foreldre – det fortidde traume?
(Separation children and parents – the hidden trauma)

Bjorn Bjoro: A system that wears people down

Marianne Haslev Skånland: Some professional child experts (1) – Kari Killén, social worker and dr.philos

Marianne Haslev Skånland: Is biological kinship irrelevant for the life of human beings?

Marianne Haslev Skånland: The Child Protection Service (CPS) – unfortunately the cause of grievous harm – Part 1: First encounters with the system and the court procedures

Marianne Haslev Skånland: The Child Protection Service (CPS) – unfortunately the cause of grievous harm – Part 2: Content, dimensions, causes and mechanisms of CPS activities

Suranya Aiyar: Articles 42-46 here

familien-er-samlet: 5 years as refugees

Marianne Haslev Skånland: Norwegian Supreme Court judgment: A father is to go to jail for 5 months for having kept his daughter away from the cps Barnevernet's care

Marta Straume: Child protection on Norway's main street

Marianne Haslev Skånland: The Council of Europe with a critical report on European child protection systems

Marianne Haslev Skånland: Human Rights in Norway – as Low as they can Go

  

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