Japan’s top court on Friday recognised a transgender woman as the “father” of her 3-year-old daughter conceived using her frozen sperm and born to her female partner after legally transitioning, in the first such ruling.
Scrapping a High Court ruling, the Supreme Court recognised the parent-child relationship of the woman in her 40s, who was assigned male at birth and underwent gender reassignment surgery in 2018, and her second daughter, born in 2020, using sperm preserved before her transition.
“If a child cannot seek recognition because of a gender change, he or she cannot receive support as a dependent or become an heir. This is clearly contrary to the child’s welfare and interests,” the ruling said.
The Tokyo High Court ruling in August 2022 said the trans woman can only be recognised as the parent to her first daughter born before the legal gender change, but not after, resulting in different parent-child relationship statuses for the daughters.
The decision came despite both children being confirmed as biological children of the woman and her partner through DNA tests.
The woman applied for recognition as a parent of two daughters at a local government after switching from male to female in 2018 between the two births but was rejected.
The family then sought a legal remedy, filing a lawsuit with a Tokyo Family Court in 2021, but the court did not recognise the woman as a parent for both daughters.
Japan does not recognise same-sex marriage. The country’s law on gender dysphoria requires surgery to remove a person’s reproductive capabilities to register a gender change, but a top court decision in 2023 said that was unconstitutional.
