Tragedy of children abducted from dads and taken to Japan

 

http://www.atimes.com/article/tragedy-of-children-abducted-from-dads-and-taken-to-japan/

 

Tragedy of children abducted from dads and taken to Japan

 

Parents from the US and around the world are firewalled from children held by estranged spouses – and Japanese parents face similar agonies

 

By PETER J. BROWN and JAKE ADELSTEIN JANUARY 16, 2019 4:06 PM (UTC+8) 

Keisuke Christian Collins with his father Randy Collins. The two have not met since 2008, when the boy was abducted by his mother. Photo: Randy Collins

Japanese leaders and diplomats regularly lambast North Korea for the abduction of their citizens by state spies – one of countless human rights abuses committed by Pyongyang.

What is less known is that hundreds of American children have been abducted to Japan in defiance of international conventions, while at home, hundreds of thousands of Japanese children suffer from de facto parental kidnappings.

American Randy Collins of Santa Ana, California, is all too familiar with the situation. He last saw his son, Keisuke Christian Collins – then five years old – in June 2008.

Only three days after a California court had ruled – for a third time – that his son was “not to be removed from the County of Orange, State of California, or the US,” his ex-wife, Reiko Nakata Greenberg Collins, fled with their son to Japan.

Only in 2015, after he learned the exact whereabouts of his son, did Collins fly to Japan to try to see him. He was unsuccessful.

“The Japanese government flagged my passport upon entry to Japan and advised Reiko I was there. She then ran away (with Keisuke) for the entire time,” Collins told Asia Times.

“When I tried to leave the country, the Yotsukaido police contacted the airline and tried to detain me at the airport. When I asked for what reason, they would not tell me. After I showed the airline employee the phone number of the US Embassy in Tokyo and said that this is my next call, the police finally allowed me to board my flight.”

The Orange County Sheriff’s Department has a warrant for Reiko’s arrest, she is on the FBI’s list for “Parental Kidnappings” and Interpol has her on its “Red Notice” roster.

But Tokyo is silent.

“Even though she is hiding in plain sight, the Japanese government will do nothing. I have not seen or heard from Keisuke in over 10½ years. All I have ever wanted is to be able to have a relationship and be a dad for my only child,” Collins said.

“Japan must be held accountable for its disregard of fundamental parental rights and its continued support of these illegal abductions.”

A shameful record

For years, Japan has been one of the most intransigent countries regarding international parental child abductions – which is exactly how the US described Japan during a US Senate hearing in 2014. Tokyo looks particularly dubious in light of the 1980 Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction.

“Japan is non-compliant,” with the convention, Collins asserted, citing the abductions of about 400 US children since 1994.

After a February 2018 meeting with US President Donald Trump, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said: “There will be no economic assistance for North Korea until it addresses the abduction issue” – a reference to Japanese citizens abducted by North Korea to train its spies.

“I agree with Prime Minister Abe,” said Collins. “And there should be no US economic or military assistance with Japan until Japan addresses the abduction issue. Why should Japan be held to any less of a standard than North Korea? North Korea returned five of those 17 who were abducted nearly 40 years ago. Japan has returned zero.”

“There is a serious flaw in Japan’s implementation of the convention,” said Suzanne Lawrence, a special advisor for children’s issues at the US State Department’s Bureau of Consular Affairs.

“This is unacceptable and I am deeply concerned that, as a result, there is a pattern of Japan not complying with its obligations under the Convention,” Lawrence said while testifying at a recent US government hearing on international child abductions. She added: “I am pleased to report that there is progress.”

Tokyo’s double game

Not everyone agrees. In mid-2018, for example, a public seminar took place in Paris organized by Japan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Japan Federation of Bar Associations. An audio recording obtained by Jeffery Morehouse, executive director of “Bring Abducted Children Home,” formed in 2011, indicated that Tokyo was coaching its citizens about how to abduct their children to Japan and how to prevent their return.

“By creating a seminar that advised potential abductors how to circumvent a (convention-compliant) return order, the government of Japan exhibited a shocking and blatant disregard for this international agreement,” said Morehouse.

Morehouse knows. He was granted sole custody of his 6½-year-old son “Mochi” Atomu Imoto Morehouse in the State of Washington in May 2007. In June 2010, he dropped him off for a week-long visit with his mother. That was the last time Morehouse ever saw Mochi.

“Six days later, I received a phone call from the police that no parent wants to receive: My son and ex-wife had been reported missing. I knew immediately what happened. She had kidnapped our son to Japan,” he said. “In that moment, my life was shattered.”

Passport and travel restraints in the court order to bar his ex-wife from leaving the state of Washington with Mochi had proven ineffectual. “When the Seattle Consulate of Japan denied her passport request she simply went to the Japanese consulate in Portland, which issued her one in violation of passport issuance policy,” he said.

Associates sometimes tell Morehouse that at least his son is safe with his mother. He strongly disagrees.

“He is not safe. Imagine being a child and your mother steals you away to a foreign country and then tells you your father does not want you anymore, or that he is dead,” he said. “Your whole life is now built on a foundation of lies. This is not what a healthy, nurturing parent does. It is child abuse.”

Despite winning landmark rulings in Japan in 2014 and 2017, Morehouse alleges “there was no intent to offer justice … it does not matter how a child ends up with the abductor in Japan, they will not uphold laws and treaties to return children to their rightful home. In the end, the court refused to reunite Mochi and me. I do not even know where he is being held.”

As a result, BAC Home emerged as a nonprofit organization dedicated to the return of internationally abducted children – not only American – from Japan. By early 2018, a new organization known as “The G7 Kidnapped to Japan Reunification Project” had united parents and organizations from Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the UK and the US.

Japanese suffer, too

Morehouse noted that many Japanese are deeply ashamed of these abductions. Indeed, it is not only international parents suffering. Due to domestic laws and enforcement – or lack thereof – thousands of Japanese are victimized by estranged partners.

Even when a Japanese parent is granted custody of a child, the other parent often refuses to comply. Police are powerless.

“When a taking parent refuses to comply with a return ordered pursuant to the convention, Japanese authorities have very limited means to enforce the order,” Lawrence, the US expert, conceded.

The problem is huge. “Research of Japanese government statistics from the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare indicates that an estimated 150,000 children per year lose access to one of their parents after divorce,” John Gomez, chairman of NGO Kizuna Child-Parent Reunion, told Asia Times. “Over 20 years, that makes an estimated three million children.”

Last September, a subcommittee of the Ministry of Justice Legislative Council started reviewing civil execution laws, which might alleviate some problems. Still, joint custody remains illegal under Japan’s divorce laws.

But questions are being raised. In July 2018, the Yomiuri Shimbun, Japan’s largest newspaper, reported on its front page that Tokyo was considering introducing joint custody to prevent custody battles and actions tantamount to the kidnappings of children by one spouse.

“Many laymen who are foreigners in Japan have a misunderstanding that foreigners are discriminated against, but that is not a comprehensive description of the scenario,” said Gomez. “Many Japanese married to a Japanese spouse are also affected.”

This, of course, provides no comfort to non-Japanese parents whose children have been abducted. Nor does it excuse Tokyo from international treaty obligations.

“Japanese judges and attorneys representing abductors manipulate the ‘best interest of the child’ to rule that the child should remain alienated and ignore how they ended up with the abducting parent,” Morehouse said. “Japan’s response to the convention is all misdirection.”

Silent voices

In Japan, Asia Times attempted to reach the Japanese parents in this story with phone calls and a visit to the last known address of one parent. There was no response at press-time.

When Asia Times attempted to contact related officials in the Japanese embassy in Washington, the attempt was rejected by the former head of chancery, Takuya Sasayama. He said he had left the embassy, declined to identify his replacement and refused to forward questions to appropriate contacts.

Morehouse testified that it was Sasayama who had informed him that “access depends on the mother and child’s wishes” – which Morehouse describes as a clear violation of the convention.

Meanwhile, what is glaringly absent from the debate are the voices of affected children.

“In the beginning of my most recent legal battle in Japan, my son, who was 13 at the time, was asked by his attorney, ‘Do you ever think about your father?’” Morehouse said. “As tears rolled down his face he replied, ‘Sometimes I dream of him at night’.”

Japan Times article profiling left-behind father Yasuyuki Watanabe

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/nn20130104f2.html

Friday, Jan. 4, 2013

Child custody injustices hard to fix
Joining Hague may curb parental abductions if legal mindset evolves

By MASAMI ITO
Staff writer
On May 6, 2010, Yasuyuki Watanabe, an internal affairs ministry bureaucrat, came home to find his wife and 2-year old daughter gone, along with their clothes.

Playing catchup: Yasuyuki Watanabe, deputy mayor of Nasushiobara, Tochigi Prefecture, speaks during an interview at a Tokyo hotel on Dec. 11. SATOKO KAWASAKI

His wife had spirited away their daughter near the end of Golden Week, just days after he was enjoying the holidays taking her on hikes and to local festivals, recalled Watanabe, 40, now deputy mayor of Nasushiobara, Tochigi Prefecture. He recounted how he carried his daughter on his back and how they sang songs together until she fell asleep, snuggling against him.

His world was turned upside down that fateful day. Last month she turned 5.

"It is so important for children to feel loved by both parents, especially when they are growing up, and I think that my daughter feels abandoned by me, that I left her because I didn't love her anymore," Watanabe told The Japan Times during a recent interview in Tokyo. "The most painful thing about my situation is when I think about how my daughter must be feeling."

Watanabe is one of many parents in Japan who have been torn away from their children after a falling-out with their spouse in a nation that grants only sole custody, usually to the mother, and where it is customary for parents not living with their offspring, to have little, if any, contact with them.

This has also been a widely reported harsh reality for foreign parents, including those living overseas whose children have been taken to Japan by estranged Japanese spouses.

These so-called parental child abductions are behind growing calls for Japan to join the international Hague treaty to prevent such cross-border kidnappings.

"These two problems are actually closely related because the domestic and international situation is the same — your children are abducted one day out of the blue and you are forbidden from seeing them," Watanabe said.

For Watanabe, what followed was a long legal battle with his wife, and divorce proceedings, which continue.

Initially his wife let him see their daughter a few times, but that stopped abruptly when he was slapped with domestic violence charges — which he branded a lie.

His wife alleged he had threatened her with a large pair of scissors while she was pregnant and told her he knew yakuza who would be willing to help him out with the situation by pushing her off a station platform in front of a train. The violence charges were later dropped.

"There is nothing more terrifying than receiving an order to appear before the court over 'DV' allegations. I was completely distraught. The judge, however, recognized that much of her claims were questionable and warned she could be charged with false accusations, so she dropped the charges the day before the ruling was to be made," Watanabe said.

But his wife then filed a lawsuit, demanding custody of their child and, again, adding allegations of abuse.

Last February, presiding Judge Tatsushige Wakabayashi at the Chiba Family Court granted Watanabe's ex-wife custody of their daughter from the viewpoint of "continuity," ruled that Watanabe had committed domestic violence and rejected his demand that his daughter be returned. The Supreme Court finalized the ruling in September.

While his legal battles dragged on, Watanabe asked lawmakers to address the issue and his case was deliberated on in the Diet.

Given his public profile, Watanabe originally wished to remain anonymous. But to garner public support for his situation, he recently came forward to tell his story to the press.

"I've been labeled a DV husband, and the judge completely ignored the facts and the law in my case. I had no choice but to stand up and fight," he said.

Watanabe has solicited the help of a special group of lawmakers who are trying to get Judge Wakabayashi fired from the bench. Among the so-called left-behind parents in Japan, Wakabayashi has spurred widespread ire, especially when in 2011, he criticized then-Justice Minister Satsuki Eda for telling the Diet that priority should be placed on the welfare of the child rather than the "principle of continuity."

"There are many people in similar situations. I cannot give up for their sake. It is not just about me and my daughter. This is a battle for all children and their parents," Watanabe said.

According to data compiled by family courts, there were 409 parents seeking the return of their offspring from an estranged spouse in 2001, whereas by 2011, there were 1,985 parents seeking to get their kids back. The numbers, however, reflect only the legal cases filed by left-behind parents that were officially accepted by the nation's family courts. Experts speculate they constitute only the tip of the iceberg.

Masayuki Tanamura, a professor of family law at Waseda University, said various factors are behind the increase in parental child abductions, including Japan's sole custody principle and the current legal framework that generally grants that right to mothers.

"Times have changed — fathers are more involved in child-rearing, and the legal system — including the principle of sole custody — makes battles over children more likely to happen. I think this part of Japan's legal system is outdated," Tanamura said.

One major difference that makes Japan's legal system peculiar is that when an estranged spouse initially takes a child, it isn't considered a crime. This is because it is common for an estranged parent, generally the mother, to take the children to her parents' domicile if a divorce is being contemplated.

But if the left-behind parent then subsequently tries to retrieve the offspring spirited away from their home, the action is considered kidnapping. Tanamura claimed there are many cases in which parents who spirit offspring away are unaware such action could be construed as abduction. From their point of view, they are merely considering a divorce or fleeing an abusive environment.

"It is hard to label all parental kidnappings as illegal . . . but at the same time, there are many cases that could constitute a double standard. It's OK for mothers to first take the children away, but when the fathers try to get them back, this is illegal," Tanamura said. "This is based on the longtime concept that children belong with their mothers."

To prevent children from losing access to both parents after a separation, Article 766 of the Civil Law was revised in 2011 to specify that visitation rights, child-support payments and other matters be determined during nonlitigated divorce proceedings, and that the welfare of the child be considered first.

But even this change can't help people like Watanabe because his case was ruled on after the amendment. "The aim of the revision is to promote forming agreements (over child care) when getting a divorce. But there is nothing that guarantees compliance," Tanamura said.

Tanamura and other experts thus agree that if and when Japan signs the 1980 Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction, it must at the same time institute fundamental changes in the legal system, and the public mindset must also be overhauled, or joining the convention will lead to naught.

John Gomez, chairman of the recently founded Kizuna Child-Parent Reunion, a group of Japanese and non-Japanese parents, friends and supporters advocating the right of children to have access to both parents, emphasized the need for left-behinds to cooperate because simply joining the Hague Convention will not solve anything in Japan if it continues to take a one-sided approach to domestic custodial rights.

"The problem of international cases and in-country cases has the same root cause — Japanese family law and the courts," Gomez said.

"The abduction issue affects all people in Japan — mothers as well as fathers, Japanese as well as non-Japanese."

The Hague treaty aims for the swift return of children wrongfully taken out of the country of their "habitual residence" by a parent to prevent cross-border parental kidnappings. Of the Group of Eight countries, Japan is the only nation yet to sign the convention.

Japan has been under pressure from member states, including the United States, the United Kingdom and Canada, to join the convention, but it has been reluctant, given strong domestic opposition, especially from Japanese mothers who claim they fled to Japan with their children to protect themselves from abusive ex-spouses.

Facing severe criticism from the international community, however, Japan finally reached the point of submitting a bid to sign the treaty and Hague-related legislation to the Diet during the last session presided over by Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda's Democratic Party of Japan. But the politicians instead spent most of their time bickering over internal power struggles related to other domestic issues, pushing the Hague Convention to the sidelines once again.

And it remains unclear whether the issue will move forward under the new government led by the Liberal Democratic Party.

Government officials have expressed confidence that once deliberations begin, the Hague bid will be approved by the Diet. But parents, including Gomez, a longtime Japan resident who himself is separated from his Japanese wife and is having difficulty seeing his daughter, say joining the Hague treaty is only a step in the right direction, not a silver bullet.

Gomez explained that on the legal front, parental kidnappings must be stopped, visitation rights made enforceable and the idea of joint custody introduced. But he added that public awareness must also be raised at the same time so the public understands the benefits of the changes to ensure the rules are followed.

"The Hague is only one tool. The ultimate goal for us is a social and legal transformation of Japan . . . a complete transformation in terms of mindset and practice," Gomez said. "We firmly believe, Japanese and non-Japanese alike, that the social and legal transformation is for the betterment of Japanese society and children and improvement in the quality of life."

Estimated 150,000 children a year lose parental access rights in Japan

These statistics were provided by John Gomez of Kizuna-CPR (http://kizuna-cpr.org/meeting_summary_november_24_2012):

“4.6 million divorces 1992 – 2010, one child per divorce on average, 58% loss of access according to NHK Close Up Gendai yields an estimated 2.7 million children in Japan who have lost their relationship with their parent during this time, which is a human rights violation. It is about 150,000 children per year.”

That means every hour an additional 17 children living in Japan are being shut out of the life of one of their parents.  Considering the cumulative impact, not just in terms of the number of children involved, but also left-behind parents, family members, and others, this problem is having a devastating effect on a sizeable percentage of the Japanese population.

Left-behind parents deliver letter to U.S. embassy and march in Tokyo

Left-behind parents in Tokyo have intensified efforts in advance of Secretary of State Clinton’s July 8 visit to Japan:

http://www.kizuna-cpr.org/

http://www.meetup.com/Left-Behind-Parents-Japan/events/72028092/?a=md1.1_grp&rv=md1.1

Approval of Hague Convention Appears Far From Certain

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/nn20120413f2.html

Friday, April 13, 2012

Fate of child abductions bill in Diet uncertain

By MASAMI ITO

Staff writer

The government finally submitted legislation to the Diet last month for joining the Hague Convention on international child abductions but its passage appears far from certain.

Western allies have long pressured Japan to join the 1980 Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction, and are watching closely to see whether Tokyo lives up to an earlier promise to ratify it.

But the prospects of this happening in the near future already appear bleak because lawmakers are preoccupied with just one issue — Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda’s plan to hike the consumption tax.

Although Noda’s administration has decided to push for signing the Hague Convention, lawmakers in both the ruling and opposition camps have serious reservations and the bill’s passage is in doubt. According to the Lower House secretariat, a bill was submitted to the Diet in early March but has not even been referred to a committee for deliberation yet.

Lawmakers opposed to the treaty argue that joining it may result in children being forcibly returned to an abusive environment, since many Japanese mothers have cited domestic violence as a reason for fleeing their overseas domiciles and taking their children to Japan.

But abandoned spouses, who end up with little or no access to their children, have been urging Japan to take action.

At a seminar about the Hague Convention on Monday, Kazuyuki Hamada, a parliamentary secretary at the Foreign Ministry, admitted it’s possible the bill may not be approved by the end of the Diet’s current session.

Hamada, however, confirmed that the ministry is treating the issue as its top priority and will do everything in its power to ensure the bill’s passage.

“The political maneuvering is not easy because we are surrounded by so many (competing) political agendas,” Hamada said. “(Given) these agendas, we are not 100 percent certain we can ratify the Hague Convention by the end of this Diet session.

“But we are determined to push it forward because the issue is hugely relevant to the values of not only of our country, but also those of the international community,” he said.

Kirsten, an American mother who attended the seminar and asked that her last name be withheld, recounted how her former Japanese spouse abducted her 14-year-old son, in Japan. Although the case technically does not fall under the Hague Convention, many former partners in the nations, whether they are Japanese or foreigners, experience difficulty getting access to their children after they divorce of break up.

Kirsten said she was granted legal guardianship of her son after she separated from her husband, but the boy never returned from a visit to his father in 2007. Her former husband held their son for more than a year before the courts acknowledged he should be returned to his mother.

“I used to respect my dad and looked forward to seeing him on the weekends with my sister. But one time I went to my dad’s without my sister and was told that I would no longer be able to see my mother. I was really shocked,” said Kirsten’s son, who wished to remain anonymous.

The boy said he spent that year with his father looking forward to the postcards that his mother regularly sent him.

“I was very confused about the decisions my dad made. I didn’t understand why I couldn’t be with my mother,” he said.

But after they were reunited, he said he was also able to gradually rebuild his relationship with his father.

Akiko Ohnogi, a psychologist who specializes in child and family counseling and has worked on many child abduction cases, stressed the importance of maintaining healthy relationships with both parents.

Such relations have “an impact on (the child’s) entire life — it’s not just something that happens during childhood and eventually goes away,” he said.

“The attachment to both parents determines how children view themselves, how they view interpersonal relationships and their general world view.”

Other panelists at the seminar included Colin P.A. Jones, a professor at Doshisha Law School in Kyoto and an expert on international child abductions.

The seminar was jointly organized by child rights advocates John Gomez and David Hearn, who directed the movie “From the Shadows” on the theme of international and domestic parental abductions, and which is currently in postproduction. The event was supported by the Harvard Club of Japan.

“From the Shadows” (work in progress version) to be screened in Tokyo on April 9

A work in progress version of “From the Shadows,” a documentary about family child abductions in Japan, will be screened in Tokyo on April 9 at 6:00 PM.  This is being supported by the Harvard Club of Japan and will be held at the Tokyo Foundation (map).

There will also be a seminar earlier in the day starting at 1:00 pm. Dr. Colin Jones and Dr. Akiko Ohnogi will be presenting and it is shaping up to be a very educational day with many perspectives to be shared, and ideas to be exchanged.

The 4,000 yen charge for the film screening will go to cover the cost of the venue and also fund our final stages of post-production, notably the online edit and the sound mix. If you would like to attend one or both events, please RSVP to john Gomez at: john.gomez.83@post.harvard.edu .

Here is a video invitation to the screening:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cAv5pcqWogY&feature=youtu.be