A man who abducted his daughters from their mother and left them with family in Libya nearly eight years ago has been jailed for the fifth time.
44-year-old Mohammed El Zubaidy was handed a 12-month jail term for failing to act on court orders to return the two girls to the UK.
The orders had been made during a High Court fight with his estranged wife Tanya Borg after El Zubaidy took his daughters, Angel and Maya, to Tripoli in early 2015 and is believed to have left them with his mother.
Ms Borg, from Pewsey, Wiltshire, hasn't spoken to her daughters — now aged 11 and 22 — in years and El Zubaidy has refused to tell her exactly where they are.
Angel has been classed by judges as a "vulnerable" adult and Judge Sir Jonathan Cohen said that the case was "about as bad a case as it is possible to imagine" during a hearing in the Family Division of the High Court in London on Friday.
Libyan law prevents El Zubaidy's daughters from returning to the UK without their father's consent.
Prior to his most recent sentencing, the father had been handed four other jail terms of between 12 months and two years for ignoring court orders to reunite them with their mother, who he met two decades ago.
But earlier this year Ms Borg complained that her estranged husband was still in breach of the orders and asked Sir Jonathan to impose a fifth jail sentence.
She was left disappointed after Friday's hearing, telling the PA news agency she had hoped for a longer sentence, "the more the better," she said.
The concerned mother added: “Two years would have been better. He only does six months.”
Handing El Zubaidy his 12-month jail term, Sir Jonathan said: “He will not even let their mother know where they are, she has no means of contacting them and has not been able to speak to them for years.
“He has wilfully breached court orders – it is a matter of no concern for him whatsoever.
“The children are being kept in a country which the father himself has described as dangerous.”
The judge added: “It is said the children are with their maternal grandmother but there is no way to confirm that is the case, or whether the children are in good health or not.
“I regard this as about as bad a case as it is possible to imagine.”
El Zubaidy had been given a 12-month term in 2017, separate jail terms of two years and 12 months in 2018, and another 12-month term in 2021.
Judges had heard that he had left prison earlier this year and Ms Borg said she believes that he is living in Wood Green in north London.
