Norway’s infamous child welfare agency known as Barnevernet has taken permanent custody of three American children from their American mother and Lithuanian father. 

Natalya Shutakova, a US citizen who last year moved to Norway from Atlanta, Georgia with her husband, Lithuanian citizen Zigintas Aleksandravicius, had their final meeting with their children today. They will now be allowed to visit them only 3 times per year.

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“Our hearts are shattered, I can’t hold back tears,” Natalya told CBN News. “Today is a terrible day, another hit to our family.”

The couple’s three children, 11-year-old Brigita, 9-year-old Nikita, and 7-year-old Elizabeth – all American citizens – were removed from their home by Barnevernet in May, less than a year after the family moved to a town about 70 miles outside of Oslo.

“We had our last meeting with our children and right after that our lawyer called and informed us of a decision against us,” Natalya said. “But this is not surprising since this court belongs to Barnevernet. It’s their court. Now we will appeal to ‘Tingrett’ which is regular court and there’s more chances of winning there.”

The children were taken by Barnevernet after the oldest child, Brigita, upset that her cell phone had been taken away as punishment, made up a story at school about being abused at home. She has since said she was lying and made a video for the judge in the case stating that she was lying, but it was disregarded.

On the video, Brigita says, “Now I feel very sorry. I want my mom and dad back. I want my family back.”

Natalya told CBN News, “Monday, September 16, I presented Brigita’s video in court. The next day, Tuesday, her phone was broken. I have no doubt this was done intentionally to stop her from making these videos, which she was posting on her Tiktok account.”

Last month, Norwegian police dropped criminal charges against the parents.

Marius Reikerås, a Norwegian human rights counsel before the European Court of Human Rights, told us, “There is something severely wrong going on in Norway that you are taking children out of the well-working families. We’re not talking about child abuse and we are not talking about alcoholism or drug abuse. We are talking about, in general, about normal families that have all the capabilities to provide good care for their children.”

The parents must wait a month and a half for their appeal of the decision. “We will miss our son’s birthday in 2 weeks,” Natalya said. “We are not allowed to see them.”

UPDATE: There has been a new development in the case of these American children who were abducted by the Norwegian government last week. Natalya Shutakova says after she sent this CBN News story about her case to the US embassy in Oslo, they contacted her and have requested a meeting with her Tuesday.

(Excerpt from CBN News. Article by Dale Hurd.)