Two British born brothers have won an Appeal Court ruling allowing them to live in England with their father against the wishes of their French mother who wanted them stay with her in France.

One of the presiding judges, Lord Justice Thorpe, described it as a very exceptional case.

The marriage between the boys’ British father and French mother broke down in 2005. The two brothers, aged 11 and 16, had lived all their lives in England and spoke hardly any French. Their mother took them to live with her in the south of France but they couldn’t settle.

Then, after visiting their father in England, they refused to return to France because they said they hated living there. The mother suspected they had been influenced by their father and took legal action to have them returned to France under the Hague Convention. The Convention upholds the international agreement banning abduction and normally demands that cases should be heard in the courts where the children had been living – in this case, France.

However, the High Court noted that the boys had been very strong in expressing their view that they wanted to stay in England and ruled that they should be granted their wish.

The Appeal Court judges agreed, saying that although it was right that the principles of the Convention should be upheld, these were exceptional circumstances as the boys had expressed their wishes so strongly. They refused to allow the mother to appeal against the High Court ruling.