• 09
  • December
    2010

As discussed in prior posts, the issue of international child custody/international child abduction is gaining increasing recognition here in the United States as the number of divorces between people of differing nationalities continues to grow.

In fact, one aspect of this issue that has generated significant controversy over the past few decades is the difficulty encountered by U.S.-based parents trying to get their children back from Japan and India, two countries that have long been labeled as key political and military allies.

To illustrate the gravity of the problem, consider that over 300 cases involving over 400 children who were abducted to Japan or India have been opened by the U.S. State Department over the past 16 years.

The primary problem is that neither country is a signatory to the 1981 Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction - a treaty that essentially forbids parents from fleeing with their children to any of the 82 participating countries. Consequently, there are often no penalties for a fleeing parent and few legal remedies for the parent who has lost their child.

While Japan has expressed interest in signing the Hague Convention for several years, it has yet to take any decisive action. Why? Officials worry that becoming a signatory nation would leave Japanese women and their children exposed to the dangers posed by abusive foreign spouses.

(Under Japan's current family court system, child custody is typically granted to only one parent while the other parent seldom receives any sort of visitation rights. Furthermore, Japanese courts do not recognize foreign custody orders.)

The consequences of this stance are that parents who have had their children abducted to Japan are left with few options. In fact, the State Department stated that it knows of no cases where an abducting parent has been ordered by a Japanese court to return their child to the United States.

Unfortunately, the situation is not much better in India, where the current government has given no indication that it plans to sign the Hague Convention.

"Once a child has been abducted to India, remedies are few," said a State Department official advisory. "India does not consider international parental child abduction a crime and the Indian courts rarely recognize U.S. custody orders, preferring to exert their own jurisdiction in rulings that tend to favor the parent who wants to keep the child in India."

To be continued ....

If you are currently involved in a child custody dispute or have questions regarding international child custody, you should strongly consider speaking with an experienced legal professional.

This post is provided for informational purposes only and is not to be construed as legal advice.

Stay tuned for more from our Denver divorce blog ...

Related Resources:

Japan, India Pressed to Curb Child Abductions (The Washington Post)