The 10-year-old girl who has found her family with her father and his partner in Malta will be staying here following a judgement given this morning by Mr Justice Joseph Azzopardi.

The battle is, however, not over, as the Attorney General shall be appealing the decision.

The girl was ordered by a judge to return to her mother in the UK but a last-ditch attempt was made by lawyers who resorted to the Constitutional Court claiming a breach of rights.

Mr Justice Joseph Azzopardi listened to what the girl, Ella Bridge, had to say in his chambers before the case started last week.

Ella’s father, Richard, had started the legal battle when her mother, Nicki Lee, successfully argued in a British court that her permission should have been sought before her daughter was taken from the UK.

The Family Court in Malta ordered Ella to return to the UK and an appeal was thrown out on a legal technicality because it was filed two days late.

Handing out judgement this morning, Mr Justice Azzopardi said that the girl’s fundamental human rights would be breached if she was ordered to return to her biological mother’s care because this would deny her the right to family life.

The girl, he said, convinced him that she was happy in Malta and that she had also accepted her father’s partner as her own mother and loved her as such.

At the end of the sitting, the judge warned lawyer Aron Mifsud Bonnici to be wary of the media because cases were not decided by them and any extra publicity which would put pressure on judges might have the opposite effect of what the lawyers desired.

The scene after the judgement was read was an emotional one with the lawyers and retired judge Philip Sciberras, who was helping them, crying with joy over the decision.