MP Yacubian submits draft bill canceling forcible imprisonment of mother 

The Appellate Attorney General, Judge Samir Hamoud, yesterday issued a circular to all appellate prosecutors covering a number of procedures to be observed at the time of arrest. These included, assigning the judicial police during the execution of court rulings related to child custody and parenting orders as well as seeking assistance of social workers and mentioning this in the record. Also yesterday, MP Paula Yacubian submitted an accelerated draft law revoking the forcible confinement of the mother who refuses to give in her child. In the explanatory statements of the proposal, that “it is unacceptable to jail mothers on charges of maternity and turn Article 998 of the Code of Civil Procedure into the Sword of Damocles hanging over their heads and authorizing their imprisonment if they were so attached to their own children, as happened recently. To recall, Article 998 supports the jailing of a person ordered by the court to hand over their children should they refuse to do so during the execution of the order.  Yacubian referred to the international conventions signed by Lebanon, including the International Conventional on the Rights of the Child (Law. No. 20, 30/10/1990) which requires the Judiciary to give due consideration to children in any court proceedings concerning them.  (Al Mustaqbal, Al Diyar, November 14, 2018)