Brown's plea over abducted girl

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Prime minister Gordon Brown has asked the Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi to intervene in the abduction case of a girl from Greater Manchester.

He made his request for the repatriation of Nadia Fawzi, a six-year-old from Wigan, at the G8 summit in L'Aquila in Italy on Friday.

She was taken by her Libyan father and taken to his native country in 2007 after he lost a custody battle.

Col Gaddafi has promised to "look into the matter as soon as possible".

It will bring fresh hope to Nadia's mother, Sarah Taylor, who has been fighting for her daughter's return since she was secretly flown to Libya by her father.

She has flown out to the country and tried to convince a judge in Tripoli that under Sharia Law she should have her daughter back.

I'm throwing myself at your mercy and appealing to you as a family man to help me find and hold my little girl in my arms again. Sarah Taylor's plea to Muammar Gaddafi

Her ex-husband defied a High Court ruling that Nadia should stay with her mother.

Shortly after the time of the abduction, Ms Taylor, who is divorced from Nadia's father, told BBC Radio Manchester that she had written to Col Gaddafi begging for his help.

Part of her letter read: "I'm throwing myself at your mercy and appealing to you as a family man to help me find and hold my little girl in my arms again."

She has since moved to the country in a bid to be closer to her daughter and vowed never to return to the UK without Nadia.

It was the first time Mr Brown and Col Gaddafi have met.

The Libyan leader was an international pariah for years following the Lockerbie bombing, for which Libya was blamed.