Madonna's son Rocco Ritchie fled Rebel Heart tour for London over singer's strict rules

Fresh claims have emerged in the dispute between Madonna and her ex-husband Guy Ritchie over custody of their son Rocco Ritchie. The 15-year-old was allegedly unhappy with the strict rules implemented by the queen of pop on her Rebel Heart tour, so he fled to London where his father is based.

Madonna, who is in the midst of her world tour, is said to have confiscated Rocco's mobile phone believing that it was distracting the youngster from his homework. A source reportedly told The Mirror: "Madonna is quite firm with Rocco and she took his phone from him when it interfered with his studies. She is stricter than Guy and Rocco doesn't like it. When she took the phone away, it pushed him over the edge."

The 57-year-old singer has custody of Rocco but sought help from a judge to force the teenager to return to the US after he flew to London to spend Christmas with his film director father. Judge Deborah Kaplan ruled: "I'm directing the child to be returned to New York. If he wants to stay with his father, he must return to his mother."

According to TMZ, Ritchie, 47, has hired a legal team to fight for custody of Rocco, who reportedly feels his mother is "too controlling" and wants to live with his father and stepmother Jacqui Ainsley permanently in the UK. Relations between Rocco and Madonna, who is also mother to daughters Lordes and Mercy and son David, appear to have deteriorated further with reports claiming the teen has blocked his mother on Instagram.

Addressing the claims, a source said: "It's not a great sign that Rocco is blocking his mum on social media, especially after all the reports that she was embarrassing him with her posts about him. It's even more of a blow because he allows Jacqui [Ainsley, his stepmother] and Guy to still follow him and he follows them back. Hopefully this is just a teenage teething problem."

Madonna has not spoken about the custody battle directly in public but she did share a photo of herself with Rocco on Instagram at Christmas, writing: "Merry X-mas to the Sun-shine of my Life!" A hearing over the custody battle has been scheduled to take place in New York in February.