US says Japanese laws on int’l child custody raising concerns in Washington, could affect ties

US to Japan: Solve int’l child custody problems

TOKYO — Japan should work to solve problems in international child custody cases that prevent foreigners from seeing their children, a senior U.S. official said Tuesday, hinting the issue could hurt bilateral relations.

Visiting U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Kurt Campbell said Tuesday that so-called “child abduction” issues have “raised very real concerns among senior and prominent Americans in Congress, on Capitol Hill and elsewhere.”

“This situation has to be resolved in order to ensure that U.S.-Japan relations continue on such a positive course,” he said during a visit to Tokyo.

Japanese law permits only one parent to have custody of children in cases of divorce — nearly always the mother. That leaves many fathers, including foreigners, unable to see their children in Japan until they are grown.

The issue gained attention last year when American Christopher Savoie was arrested in Japan after he snatched his two children from his Japanese ex-wife’s hands as they walked to school. His ex-wife Noriko Savoie had violated a U.S. court custody issue by taking the children from Tennessee to Japan a month earlier.

Savoie was eventually released and allowed to leave the country on condition he leave his children behind.

There are more than 75 cases of American parents who are kept from seeing their children in Japan, and Campbell met with several of them earlier Tuesday, calling their situations “tragic.”

“The United States government strongly believes that these children have a right to enjoy the love of both parents and the benefits of both cultures,” said Campbell.

Campbell’s comments are some of the strongest to date on this issue, with Tokyo coming under increased international pressure to sign on to the Hague Convention on International Child Abduction, which is designed to address such international custody disputes.

On Saturday, ambassadors from the U.S., Britain, Australia and five other countries met with Japanese Foreign Minister Katsuya Okada to urge Tokyo to join the convention and allow for foreign parents to visit their children in Japan.

Campbell said he is discussing the topic with Okada during his visit. He said the two countries had set up a process of bilateral meetings to address the issue.

Tokyo has argued in the past that signing the convention could endanger Japanese women and their children trying to flee abusive foreign husbands, although Okada has said the government was studying the matter.