In Paz v Paz, 169 F.Supp.2d 254 (S.D. New York, 2001) the father filed a petition pursuant to the Hague Convention on Civil Aspects of Child Abduction and sought an order requiring his estranged wife to return their daughter to his custody in New Zealand. The District Court held that the father did not establish the child's acclimatization to New Zealand so as to remove the child from the mother's custody in New York, and sufficient evidence existed to find that shared intentions of the parents was that child would live with the father in New Zealand during year on temporary basis only, and not that child came to live in New Zealand with the father indefinitely. Under the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of Child Abduction, a United States District Court has the authority to determine the merits of an abduction claim, but not the merits of the underlying custody claim. A child's country of habitual residence, according to the Hague Convention is best place to decide upon questions of custody and access. The relevant period of habitual residence, for purposes of determining child custody, is that span of time immediately before the date of the alleged wrongful retention. The Father did not establish the child's acclimatization to New Zealand so as to justify removal of child from the mother's custody in New York. Although the child attended school during her ten-month stay in New Zealand and made friends during that time, she also attended school in Peru and New York for more than a semester and made friends in New York, had extended family in the United States, her country of residence changed at least nine times, and, before her stay in New Zealand she did not reside in any one country for an uninterrupted period longer than six months and stated that she would like to stay in the United States. Sufficient evidence existed to find that the shared intentions of the parents was that the child would live with the father in New Zealand during the year on a temporary basis only, and not that the child came to live in New Zealand with their father indefinitely so as to support the removal of the child from the mother's custody in New York to the father's custody in New Zealand. The mother established a pattern of control over where the child lived and this pattern was established when the mother received an order from Otahuhu family court granting her primary custody of the child, allowing the father to visit only during short periods. The mother later received an amendment to this order allowing her to leave the country with the child, and the child had moved nine times, most of the time with the mother.