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Yesterday
was the UK launch of
International Missing Childrens Day (IMCD).
The day began with an interview about Andrew (& the bicycle ride) on
ITV?s Good Morning TV program. This is the most widely viewed news &
public interest program in the UK. It is also broadcast into Europe
where it is watched by many thousands of UK ex-pats & holiday-makers.
Photographs of Andrew & Melinda were featured throughout the program &
have now been posted on the GMTV website, as well as their Twitter page.
This was followed a short time later by the official launch of IMCD at
The Deck, which is part of the National Theatre. The launch was attended
by a large number of very senior government officials;
left-behind-parents & family members, and national & international
media.
I was invited to deliver a speech as part of the launch during which I
raised a number of issues including the enormous range of negative
psychological effects experienced by abducted children; the role of the
international media in helping to find missing children; shortcomings in
The Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child
Abduction (The Hague Convention); the need for improved anti-child
abduction legislation in several countries; the gross violation by
abducting parents of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the
Child, & the role of new technologies in locating missing children.
I also talked about the circumstances surrounding Andrew's abduction &
disappearance, & the international effort being put into finding him and
Melinda.
Immediately after the launch, there was a very high level of media
interest in Andrew by media outlets including the BBC & Al Jazeera.
It was a very moving experience being with other parents whose children
have been abducted and meeting for the first time with the many people
who are trying to find them, including representatives of missing
children organisations, senior government officials including the UK's
most senior police officers, and senior staff from the UK Police Missing
Children's Unit.
A highlight of the event for me was meeting six-year-old Nadia Taylor &
her mother Sarah. Nadia was abducted to Libya by her father when she was
four. Her mother fought all efforts by Nadia's father to stop Nadia
being returned to the UK and to prevent Nadia having any contact with
her mother. Sarah refused to give up & took the unprecedented measure of
enlisting the personal support of Libyan leader Colonel Gadaffi to have
Nadia returned to the UK. Nadia is a wonderful little girl who sat with
me while her mother delivered an address to the audience. Nadia kept
telling me to keep looking for Andrew because she knows he wants to see
his dad.
Despite everything that has happened, Nadia's mother is doing everything
possible to make sure Nadia has every opportunity to maintain her
relationship with her father. I also had a long talk to
Kate McCann
whose search for her daughter
Madeleine is unrelenting. We've agreed
to stay in touch because we both share the horrible ordeal of not
knowing where our children are.
I also caught up with two wonderful & determined ladies I'd been very
privileged to meet a couple of days before the launch. Denise Allan-Hovarth
has been searching for her son Charles who disappeared while holidaying
in Canada 21 years ago. Cathy Phillips has been searching for her sister
(Maria) who disappeared from the southern part of England 21 years ago
as well & her case has just been reopened by police. Neither of them has
given up searching for their child & sibling.
The list of parents I met at the launch is very extensive. Sadly, it's a
sign of how serious the problem of International Parental Child
Abduction has become. Everyone agreed that more needs to be done to
reduce the risk of this happening to other kids by addressing the types
of issues I raised in my speech.
My London cycling skills have improved to the extent that the past four
days have seen me cycling more than 200 kilometres in & around Central
London (even the bus drivers & taxi drivers are sharing the bus lanes
with me now!). I cycled to Buckingham Palace on Sunday where dozens of
people from many different countries approached me to ask about Andrew &
to take ?Missing Andrew? bumper stickers. The same thing happened at the
other tourist icons I cycled to as well.
At the end of the IMCD events, I cycled along the banks of the Thames
River from to Kingston-on-Thames to prepare for the next stage of the
ride, which will take me from London to Bournemouth in the south of
England. |
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ANDREW JOHN THOMPSON PHOTOGRAPHS |
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| ken ?? -
Chief
Inspector Peter Neyroud - Sarah Nadia |
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| Ken Nadia Sarah |
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Ken Thompson
Father of Andrew Mr
Thompson last saw his son on
the 22 April 2008 - two days
before he was abducted.
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BBC-25-05-10 |
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Ken Thompson
Father of Andrew Mr Thompson |
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| Andrews Grandmother |
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| Andrews Grandmother Andrew and Father Ken |
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Andrew and
Father Ken |
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| Andrew and Father Ken |
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| Andrew and Father Ken |
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| Andrew and Father Ken |
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| Andrew and Father Ken |
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| Andrew and Father Ken |
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| Andrew and Father Ken |
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Andrews Mother
Melinda |
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Andrews Mother
Melinda |
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Andrews Mother
Melinda |
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Andrews Mother
Melinda |
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http://www.findandrew.com/
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MISSING AND MURDERED
CHILDREN NAMED IN MADELEINE MCCANN CASE |
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INTERNATIONAL MISSING
CHILDRENS DAY 2010 |
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NEWS MAY 2010 |
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