New divorcees push for DNA testing to be allowed to prove paternity of newborn children

Mainichi Daily News
January 8, 2007
Source: http://mdn.mainichi-msn.co.jp/national/news/20070108p2a00m0na009000c.html

Recently-divorced women are increasingly requesting that DNA testing be allowed to prove their newborn children's paternity, enabling them to be registered in their new husband's name.

The Civil Code currently stipulates that any child born within 300 days of the mother's divorce is recognized as being fathered by the mother's ex-husband. In order for such children to be entered in their new family register, the ex-husband must testify in court that he is not the father.

A 32-year-old woman living in Setagaya-ku, Tokyo, married her current husband in December 2004 after divorcing her previous husband six months earlier, and gave birth to her daughter in January 2005.

When she and her new husband registered their marriage at the ward office, she told an official that she was 10 months pregnant. At the time, the official told her that the child could not be registered in her husband's family register, citing the Civil Code clause.

The woman later discovered that she had to ask her former husband -- who had abused her repeatedly during their marriage -- to testify that the girl was not his child at a family court.

But after she submitted the results of DNA tests on her husband and daughter, and a testimonial from her new husband, the court officially recognized her daughter as the child of her new husband in June 2005.

"We did it as a special measure," a court official was quoted as telling her; but the woman says she wants this procedure to become more common.

"I want new rules to be worked out to allow children like mine to join in their fathers' family registries in a short period of time," the woman said.

Another 39-year-old woman, a resident of Morioka, still cannot register her daughter she gave birth to in October -- 266 days after she divorced her former husband -- in her new husband's family register.

The woman and her new husband have filed a lawsuit demanding that her divorced husband testify that he is not the father of her daughter.

"The rules should be amended to allow our daughter to join my husband's family register simply by submitting the results of DNA tests on my husband and daughter to the local government office," she said.

The Justice Ministry's Civil Affairs Bureau said it has no statistics on such legal disputes. However, the number of similar cases is believed to be increasing, experts said, noting that the proportion of remarriages is rising. (Mainichi)

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