Dubai, Divorce and the Children Caught in Between

Global mobility for families requires specialist legal advice, particularly when children are moving between countries.  When a child is wrongfully retained in Paris or Berlin, there is a well-trodden legal path to secure their return. When they are retained in Dubai, there is not. The UAE is not a signatory to the 1980 Hague Convention on International Child Abduction and for any parent left behind in England, that single fact changes the landscape entirely. There is no streamlined return mechanism. Instead, the parent must apply to the High Court in England under its inherent jurisdiction and then seek to have any English order recognised and enforced by the UAE courts. 

The scale of the problem is not diminishing. Geopolitical instability in the Middle East has added a further complication, with some parents relying on the conflict as a basis to withhold children from the other parent. As we recently told the Financial Times, the conflict had given one client in Dubai who had possession of their child "another excuse for further delay" in returning the child to the UK. Flight cancellations and sporadic airspace closures can lend apparent weight to such arguments, even where the underlying motivation may have little to do with safety. 

Against this backdrop, the recent High Court decision in AM v AF (Return Order: Dubai) [2026] EWHC 511 (Fam) merits careful attention. The facts will be familiar to many practitioners advising expatriate families. A couple relocated to Dubai in 2023 for the mother's teaching position, selling their home in England and moving all their possessions. The marriage broke down, the father returned to England, and the children remained in Dubai with their mother. When the children came to England for an agreed summer holiday visit in 2025, the father issued proceedings to retain them. The mother applied for a return order under the inherent jurisdiction. 

The court's analysis on habitual residence is particularly instructive. The father argued that the move had always been "temporary" and tied to the mother's employment contract; the mother contended it was "permanent". The court rejected both characterisations, finding instead that the move was "open-ended". Crucially, the court held that the fact that the family's immigration status, accommodation and income all depended on the mother's job did not prevent the children from becoming habitually resident in Dubai - reasoning that to hold otherwise would mean that "no expatriate families could become habitually resident in the country in which they are living and working, which cannot be right". For the many British families whose lives in the UAE are structured around an employment package, that observation carries real weight. The court concluded that Dubai was the children's "home country" and ordered their return. 

Equally noteworthy is the court's engagement with Dubai's own legal framework. Expert evidence demonstrated that UAE family law has been substantially modernised: Federal Decree Law No. 41 of 2022 now establishes joint custody as the default for non-Muslim families and places the child's best interests at the heart of any determination. The court was evidently reassured by these reforms and that finding has implications for both sides. English judges may increasingly regard Dubai as a jurisdiction capable of safeguarding children's welfare, which strengthens the hand of a parent seeking a child's return to the UAE but poses a challenge for the parent arguing that the child should remain in England. 

That said, the practical obstacles to enforcement remain significant. There is no formal mechanism for "mirror orders" in Dubai. An English order must be domesticated, either by consent or through the more complex attestation process in the UAE. Proceedings are conducted in Arabic, and the availability of legal aid is limited, meaning that a non-Arabic-speaking parent may face considerable difficulty in navigating the process. The Dubai courts do possess extensive enforcement powers, including travel bans and attachment of assets. However, the effectiveness of any order inevitably depends in part on the willingness of both parties to engage with the process. 

The lesson of AM v AF is, ultimately, one of preparedness. The English court will act decisively under the inherent jurisdiction where a child's welfare demands it but a judgment that cannot be enforced is a judgment in name only. For any parent facing the retention of a child in the UAE, or a refusal to return a child to Dubai when a home has been established there, early and coordinated legal advice on both sides of the Gulf is not an optional extra. A court order can open the door, however, only a strategy that works in both England and the UAE can walk the child through it.