The applicant father brought an urgent motion seeking the return of the parties' two children from Lebanon to Ontario.
The respondent mother had travelled to Lebanon with the children for a planned vacation but subsequently refused to return, commencing annulment and custody proceedings in a Lebanese religious court and obtaining a travel ban.
The Ontario Superior Court of Justice found that Ontario was the children's habitual residence and assumed jurisdiction under the Children's Law Reform Act.
The court declined to defer to the Lebanese court orders, finding that the father had not been given reasonable notice or an opportunity to be heard in those proceedings.
The mother was ordered to return the children to Ontario immediately.
