Posts
Jeremy Morley
I will be
lecturing and consulting extensively in Japan, throughout the last week of this
month, on “The Hague Abduction Convention
in the U.S. and Japan,” at the invitation of the Ministry of Foreign
Affairs of Japan.
I will address the
issue of Japan’s failure to enforce return orders and the differences between
the interpretations and applications of the treaty in the two countries.
However, I will
also explain that that the differences between the United States and Japan
concerning the Convention run far deeper than these relatively superficial matters,
and that they stem from widely divergent views and practices about the appropriate
parenting of children and the role of law in private family life.
I will argue
that the pending debate about the Hague Convention is a mere sideshow to, and a
diversion from, the more fundamental issue of the best interests of children
and the fundamental human rights of parents and children after parental
separation or divorce.
I will assert that,
in the current environment, the Convention cannot adequately protect the
competing rights of parents and children in the case of abductions of children
from the United States or other countries to Japan. I will further explain that
the U.S. State Department’s designation of Japan as “noncompliant” with the
Convention, while technically accurate, addresses only the most superficial of
issues that are relevant to these matters.
I will also
explain how Japan’s adoption of the Hague Convention without addressing the
basic issue of the right of both of a child’s parents to have their children in
their lives has often proven counter-productive not only to non-Japanese
parents who wish to see their own children but also to expat Japanese parents who
wish to bring their children to visit Japan or to live in Japan if that is in
the children’s best interests.
