In an ironic twist a Czech man avoided being potentially shut out of his son’s life forever by his estranged Japanese wife. He did it by kidnapping his son and taking him out of Japan. Typically it’s the other way around a native Japanese who has a falling out with their spouse takes the kids and shuts out the other parent completely. When the shut out parent is not Japanese they are particularly screwed because the Japanese parent quietly takes the kid back to Japan without permission and the foreigner has no practical options for getting the kid back. This link leads to many personal accounts of foreigner parents being shut out of their childs lives by a former Japanese spouse.
A case that made the news recently is the Christopher Savoie case. Christopher Savoie’s former wife Noriko Savoie knew Japan does not recognize family court orders from the United States and deliberately kidnapped the kids taking them back to Japan. There are many documented cases of this type of behavior and a whole website dedicated to the issue called JCRN - Japan Children’s Rights Network. A video of the story can be seen by following the NewsChannel5.com link. The Christoper Savoie case is different because he actually went back to Japan to try and get his kids back but instead got thrown in a Japanese jail as the United States embassy refused to open their doors to him as he begged for help at their door way with his kids in his arms.
The title of the Yomiuri article is “WHEN FAMILIES BREAK UP / Parents helpless if kids spirited abroad”. Ironic isn’t it? Japan playing the victim again. What the Czech man did is avoid the Japanese system which would have been stacked against him, why play by their rules when they aren’t fair?
