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`Tug of love' kid stays with mom

Nadia Juan holds a bag of toys for her daughter Emily during a press conference in Taipei last month. Emily is trapped in a custody battle between Juan and her American father Cary Sartin. PHOTO: AFP

The mother of a little girl at the center of an international custody battle was able to take her daughter home on Thursday after a court ruled her parents could take care of the youngster alternately during the custody trial.

However, the girl's American father Cary Sartin returned home last week to appeal for the US to help him bring the three-year-old love child named Emily home.

The Taipei District Court on June 8 ruled that Emily temporarily be taken care of by Sartin during the trial, but that the girl could stay with her mother Nadia Juan (阮玫芬) for one day per week, and that mother and daughter be allowed to stay together overnight.

On Thursday afternoon Juan asked the court to let her temporarily take care of her daughter because Sartin had returned to the US. The court decided Juan could be with her daughter for two days.

A Taiwanese baby sitter hired by Sartin was told to take Emily to the court on Thursday afternoon, then handed over the girl to Juan.

According to a report in the New York Post published on June 11, Sartin released a video asking Americans to write Senators Hillary Rodham Clinton and Charles Schumer for help in his custody battle.

"What Taiwan is doing is illegal. I have physical custody of Emily, but they won't let us leave."

Cary Sartin, father of a girl caught in the middle of an international custody battle

The video was aired by a US news station last week.

In the video, he said "what Taiwan is doing is illegal. I have physical custody of Emily, but they won't let us leave."

According to the paper, at one point in the video, a weepy Sartin holds up Emily's US passport as she says in Chinese, "Daddy, I love you."

Sartin plans to send the plea to US President George W. Bush, civil-rights leaders Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton, and TV news outlets, the report added.

The Taipei District Court on May 9 decided that Sartin, a 55-year-old US citizen from New York, cannot leave the country with his daughter until a court hearing has been completed.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has said the girl's custody has to be decided by a Taiwanese court, because she is still a citizen of Taiwan.

Juan formerly worked as the New York correspondent for the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT)-run Chinese-language newspaper Central Daily News.

She has said that she had the child with Sartin in 2003, but decided to return to Taiwan in 2004 after she discovered that he was already married.

However, Sartin has told media that Juan had psychological problems. He said that she failed to appear in court in the US to defend herself and ignored a court order barring her from leaving the US with the infant during the custody trial.
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