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UPDATES ON TWITTER: arudoudebito
Hi Blog. We reported on this on October 30, but back then only two US Senators had signed. Now as of November 5, 22 US Senators have signed a letter for Obama to address Child Abductions Issue during his Japan visit. Three scanned pages follow. Courtesy of both CRN and CRC. Arudou Debito
ENDS
3 comments on “22 US Senators signed letter for Obama to address Child Abductions Issue during Japan visit”
Coverage in Japanese media:
国際親権問題：米上院議員２２人 日本に積極取り組み要請
http://mainichi.jp/select/world/news/20091110k0000e030023000c.html
国際結婚が破綻（はたん）した夫婦の一方が無断で子供を自国へ連れ帰ってしまう問題で、超党派の米上院議員２２人がオバマ大統領に書簡を送り、１３日の日米首脳会談で国際的な親権トラブルへの対処で日本の積極的な取り組みを鳩山由紀夫首相に求めるよう要請した。ウェッブ上院議員（民主党）の事務所が９日、明らかにした。
書簡は、米国から日本に子供が連れて行かれた事例が判明しているだけで７９件あり、米国籍の子供１００人以上が巻き込まれていると指摘。子供を元の国に戻す手続きを規定した「ハーグ条約」に、先進７カ国で日本だけが未加盟だとして加盟を求める一方、解決のため日米間で独自の仕組みづくりも必要と訴えた。（共同）
US senators press Japan on parental abductions
(AFP) November 10, 2009
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5giv6z5jZ3L40diGuZTh9SRYyNpbQ
WASHINGTON ‹ Nearly one-quarter of the US Senate asked President Barack
Obama on Monday to press Japan on his upcoming visit about parental
abductions, saying Tokyo’s policies were an anomaly among developed nations.
Japanese courts virtually never award child custody to divorced foreign
parents — sometimes even handing them to a child’s Japanese grandparents
instead of giving them to a foreigner.
Activists say that thousands of foreign parents have lost access to children
in Japan. The row recently was thrown in the spotlight after a US man was
briefly jailed for snatching his own children on their way to school.
In a letter to Obama, 22 senators from both parties said they were troubled
that Japan was the only nation among the Group of Seven industrialized
nations that has not signed the 1980 Hague Convention that requires
countries to return a child wrongfully kept there to their country of
habitual residence.
“While we acknowledge that Japan’s accession to the Hague Convention is an
important goal, the United States must also work with Japan to establish a
bilateral mechanism to assist with the resolution of current cases,” they
wrote.
“We urge you to ensure that the United States continues to raise this issue
at the highest possible levels in the context of our close bilateral
relationship with Japan,” the letter said.
The letter was led by Jim Webb, who heads the Senate subcommittee on East
Asia, and signed by both senators from Tennessee, the home state of
Christopher Savoie who was jailed in the high-profile child abduction case.
The letter voiced hope that Japan’s new Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama would
do more to address the issue, which was also raised last month in Tokyo by
the ambassadors of the United States and seven other Western nations.
Obama is set to visit Japan this week on the start of a four-nation trip to
Asia.
Hatoyama’s center-left Democratic Party of Japan in August ended a
half-century of nearly uninterrupted conservative rule.
Hatoyama has pledged to build a less subservient relationship with the
United States and is expected to raise with Obama a row over US bases in
Japan.