Children with Australian citizenships can thai mother take !

[tinytot]

Just wondering if anyone knows the law about thai mother wanting to take children who have Australian citizenships, 1 was born in Thailand but has now got Australian citizenship and other was born in Australia, now thai partner don't want to live Australia but when we go Thailand I am not sure if she is going to do the runner with our children, has she within the thai law to do that or because children have Australian citizenships she can do nothing.. need advice.. thanks

[Mario2008]

Both children have also Thai nationality because their mother is Thai, next to their Australian nationality.

In Thailand the mother can do a runner with the children, as in any country. What you than need to do is go to court about the custody over the children. An important factor will be if you are married to the mother and if not if you legitimized the children as yours, (If not you must take extra steps to become recognized as the legal father)

A Thai court will normally appoint one of the parents as caretaker and the other parent will have visitations rights, which could be 2 days a week or something like a weekend every month.

[Arkady]

The Thai court would with some justification ignore the fact that the children have Australian nationality. They and their mother are Thai and you are a foreigner with no rights over the children in their eyes, unless you take legal steps in Thailand to establish some, as suggested by Mario.

If you think she is planning to do a runner with the children when you go to Thailand together, you should seriously consider staying in Australia with the children. Otherwise you have to face the possibility that you will be in a blackmail situation where you are constantly asked for money against the threat you will never see your children again. One of my good friends is in exactly this situation and is now a shadow of his former self as a result. There is no solution to his problem and his children will become strangers enduring a succession of unsavory temporary "stepfathers".

Tell her you have work or financial problems or anything you like, so that you cannot afford the money or the time to go with her but you are happy to stay and look after the kids, so she can stay in Thailand as long as she likes with no burden. She may have a good reason for not wanting to live in Australia with her farang family in the form of a Thai husband back home. If so, she will probably disappear quite quickly, if she cannot monetise the children. They are quite pragmatic and many seem to find it relatively easy to forget about children and start a new family. If she misses the kids and comes back on your terms, she will have passed a test. Eventually the kids will be too old and too Australian to abduct to Thailand.