Court orders mother to return child to father in SL

Osaka Family Court ordered a Japanese woman on Wednesday to return her 4-year-old child to her Japanese husband living in Sri Lanka under the Hague treaty to settle cross-border child custody disputes.

The case is the first involving the return of a child from Japan to the original place of residence overseas in response to a domestic petition since the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction came into effect in Japan in April.

As the couple and the child lived in Sri Lanka from February last year, and the child went to school there, the court said in its judgment that the child’s original place of residence is Sri Lanka.

The woman took her child to Japan when she returned to this country in June and has since kept the child in Japan without the permission of her husband, the ruling said.(The Japan News)