Liam Kirkaldy (Reporter)
SPANISH police have launched a man-hunt for a Belgian man who snatched his daughter away from her British mother in Alicante.
Kyshan Van Der Zanden, 22, distracted the mother of his child – Gemma Mountney – by sending her on a day out with spa and shopping vouchers before disappearing with their 21 month-old child.
Mr Van Der Zanden had told nursery staff that he had a surprise planned and told them to lie if Ms Mountey called to check on her daughter.
But when Ms Mountney went to collect her daughter from the nursery she was told that she had never arrived.
Ms Moutney, originally from Oxfordshire, said, ‘It is absolutely heartbreaking. He was the single person in the world who I thought would never do something like this – I’m devastated.”
‘I miss Laylah so much and I just want her back in my arms and to be giving her a huge hug. I thought he loved and cared for me and Laylah – clearly not.”
The Guardia Civil are treating the case as kidnapping, issuing alerts to airports across Europe.
Ms Mountney said she believe that Mr Van Der Zanden’s parents knew of his whereabouts, but when she spoke to his mother she slammed the phone down.
A spokeswoman for the International Child Abduction Centre said they see around 500 cases of parental abduction every year.
Good man all these women that think they have the right to a child they have both made..Fair play to him!!
A little harsh Joe ! Certainly the father of the child has equal rights as the mother however the history of the relationship has not been made clear ( I am certainly not suggesting any wrongdoing ).
Mothers do need to respect the needs of fathers and children if a relationship breaks down and sadly the children are usually used as bargaining chips .
Kidnap is as harsh headline when the facts are not stated .
in the fathers culture he rules the roost
as a uk girl she probably did not realise what she was getting into
but she sure is going to learn now
I just pray for a happy ending and that the child is safe. Too many tragic stories where children are used as a weapon against warring parents.