RUNAWAY mother Elaine Walker broke her silence last night and vowed never to come home to care for her teenage daughter.

Miss Walker, who denies abandoning 15-year-old Laura, said she will never return to Britain.

She said she was in love and plans to marry her boyfriend, Ali Murat, a DJ who is 20 years her junior.

Miss Walker, 45, from Redmire, near Leyburn, North Yorkshire, flew to Turkey with her other daughter, 17-year-old Stacey, nearly three weeks ago.

Both women are believed to have found boyfriends while on holiday in the country in June.

Speaking from the Turkish province of Gaziantep, Miss Walker said she had left her 15-year-old daughter with a relative.

She said: "My daughter didn't want to come because she had exams.

"She will come here for a holiday before the new year."

Miss Walker said she was prepared to risk everything to be with her lover.

"I fell madly in love with him at first sight.

"The age difference between us is completely unimportant. I won't return to Britain again."

Miss Walker and her boyfriend talked of plans to marry and how they had started to set up home together at his house in eastern Turkey.

With her boyfriend's arm draped around her, she said: "We first saw each other and liked each other. Then we would see each other every day.

"When I went home to England, I promised I would come back to Turkey to be with him.

"I did everything I could, and in three weeks I was coming back and now I'm staying with him, because I love him."

She also told how she made the first move.

"I came to Ali and told him I liked him. We sat and we talked and we knew we liked each other a lot."

Villagers in Redmire have spoken of their shock at her actions, but said her daughter is coping well.

It transpired that Miss Walker, who also has two grown-up children, had handed in her notice at work.

Laura is being cared for by relatives while waiting for her father, who is believed to live in Darlington, to return from abroad to be with her.

North Yorkshire Police said they would like to speak to Miss Walker. But a spokesman added yesterday it was still too early to say whether she would be prosecuted.