LAHORE, 10 October 2006 — A 12-year-old Scottish girl at the center of a custody battle surrendered her passports to a Pakistani court yesterday after a judge restricted her movement, court officials said.

Misbah Iram Ahmed Rana, also called Molly Campbell, appeared before Justice Mian Saqib Nisar of the Lahore High Court and handed over her Pakistani and British passports, her lawyer Abdul Basit said.

She flew in to Lahore with her father Sajjad Ahmed Rana in August, while her Scottish mother Louise Campbell claimed the girl had been abducted and would be subjected to a forced Muslim marriage.

Louise Campbell filed a petition through a local lawyer after Rana won a case in a Lahore court in September barring the government of Pakistan from repatriating the girl to Britain.

The court ordered Misbah to hand over her passports at a hearing on Sept. 26 but it did not happen until yesterday.

The judge also slapped a ban on Rana on issuing any statement to the press warning that a violation would amount to a contempt of court, Basit said.

“This court has ample jurisdiction to decide the custody matter of the minor girl,” the judge said.

“I am very open in my mind and would like to know how the girl was shifted despite a restraint order by a Sessions Court of Scotland,” he added.

He said he would also like to seek counsel’s assistance “whether morality demands that a minor girl can be handed over to an apostate mother who is living with a partner and has also given birth to a baby girl without marriage.” The court will continue the proceedings today.

Misbah has said she does not want to go back to Britain and denied she was under any pressure from her father to marry in Pakistan.

Scottish police have said the case could amount to a violation of the Child Abduction Act, but Misbah has repeatedly and publicly insisted she left of her own free will, and that her father’s Islamic culture in Pakistan suited her better.

In 2003, British and Pakistani judiciary officials signed a protocol to return abducted children to the country where they normally lived, where a court would decide on custody.

During yesterday’s court session the lawyer for the girl’s mother urged the judge to abide by the protocol and order Misbah’s return to Scotland.