I was tricked into giving Tristan away but now I want him back in

I was tricked into giving Tristan away but now I want him back in

SURYANI Dowse has vowed to fight a legal battle to keep her son - four long years after his controversial "adoption" by an Irish businessman.

It was a moment the Indonesian mother believed she would never experience again, even if her four-year-old boy Tristan did look with bewilderment.

The emotional meeting went ahead just three weeks ago as the authorities try to work out what future is best for the traumatised four-year-old boy.

He and his mother spent a just few precious hours together outside the orphanage he now lives in near Jakarta in Indonesia.

As he was taken away from her within weeks of his birth, he is unlikely to recognise her.

But for mum, Suryani, 35, it is the start of a bonding process that she hopes could eventually see them permanently reunited.

Suryanih said there was a deep and immediate bond when she picked him up and embraced him.

"Even during that short time, it seems like we had a heart-to- heart connection," she said.

Suryani insisted that she was "tricked" into giving the baby away by a suspected child trafficker called Rosdiana exposed by the Irish Sunday Mirror.

Restaurant worker Suryani added: "Me and my family want to bring him back as fast as possible."

The reunion was filmed by RTE which will screen a special one- off documentary, The Search for Tristan's Mum, on Tuesday at 9pm.

Reporter Ann McElhinney, who broke the story of Tristan's fate in the Irish Sunday Mirror five months ago and made the documentary, said: "Suryani wants the child back. It was a very emotional meeting, but shortly afterwards he was taken back by the social services to the orphanage where he is living now.

"It was the most obvious thing in the world to me to find out where she was and thought it was very important that she was heard."

Tristan's trauma started when he was adopted by Irishman Joe Dowse four years ago, after his wife Lala had difficulties conceiving.

The couple were living in Indonesia, where Joe, from Carnew, Co Wicklow, was working for an international accountancy firm.

But shortly after the adoption - which was later branded illegal by the Indonesian authorities - Lala conceived and the family decided to leave Tristan behind them, dumped in an unlicensed orphanage as they left the country.

His fate is now at the centre of an international legal battle.

After the adoption the Irish authorities recognised the Irish man as Tristan's legal father and the boy was automatically made an Irish citizen - a move which has left him in a legal limbo ever since.

'Dad' Joe refused to talk about his son yesterday.

When the Irish Sunday Mirror contacted the accountant in his home in Azerbaijan, he said: "I'm afraid I am not going to talk about this at the moment.

"Thank you very much for the call, appreciate it, but thank you, no."

But in a previous interview he tried to explain away Tristan's abandonment.

"As you can imagine it's a very emotional matter, I mean we gave Tristan a home for nearly a year-and-a-half and it all started with myself and my wife were having difficulty conceiving our own child.

"We've always believed in adoption and felt it's a good thing to do. We had our problems and we decided to adopt.

"And for a year-and-a-half we gave Tristan the best family home we possibly could.

"We did proper adoption procedures, we even went as far as to make sure that was all properly recorded with the Irish authorities, we got him a passport.

"This was not a half-hearted attempt at adoption, it was a properly done thing.

"However, over that time we came to a painful realisation that the adoption wasn't working out, an extremely difficult and painful realisation as you can understand to make and it wasn't something that we felt in Tristan's best interests to remain with us. It was not because we were planning to leave Indonesia, it just didn't work out.

"But the bottom line is, we felt that in Tristan's best long- term interest, we would like him for him to get re-adopted.

"And the place to do that, the most appropriate place was the orphanage in Indonesia. And you can imagine it was a heart- wrenching decision."

Joe said another family had been lined up to re-adopt Tristan but the process was delayed first by the tsunami disaster then by last month's earthquake.

He added: "The minister has as I understand given a verbal approval to this, but to get the letters signed and bureaucracy wheels turning has obviously taken a back-seat to the tragedies that have been occurring there.

"It didn't work out with us, so we're making strenuous efforts to get him properly placed."

But Tristan has not been able to be re-adopted because of the legal wrangle over his status has left him in limbo.

Now the Indonesia authorities are trying to deal with Tristan's situation in whatever way is best for him. A source said: "That will not necessarily mean reuniting him with his mother because that is not necessarily the best for him.

"It may mean him being re-adopted by an English-speaking Western couple as he speaks English.

"They were left alone in private but it's such an emotional thing to be going through.

"Her meeting him again is all part of that process and it will be a long process because of the trauma he has been through."

THE SEARCH FOR TRISTAN'S MUM, RTE1 TUESDAY 9.30PM

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