What rights does a child have to his parents?

Ksenia O. contacted Law Enforcement. She is married to a citizen of the European Union, pregnant, had a quarrel and is divorcing her husband, came to give birth in Russia and asks how she can properly draw up documents so that her ex-husband cannot sue for the right to raise the baby and prevent the child from moving around to the world. In a word, so that a typical international scandal with kidnappings and propaganda noise does not break out around her child.

“Pravonapadeniya” lawyer Svetlana Viktorova explained to Ksenia that if you give birth to a child in Russia and put a dash in the “father” column on the birth certificate, you will end up with double fraud. Firstly, in relation to the ex-husband - and he can easily prove that the child is his: the court will order a genetic examination. Secondly, fraud in relation to the state: if the mother officially declares that the child does not have a father, she automatically claims state benefits and payments. They will be collected from the mother if it turns out that the child has a father.

All this (as well as the fact that a child born in Russia to a Russian woman automatically becomes a Russian citizen) could be explained by an ordinary family lawyer. And “Law Attack” became interested in this case for this reason: in international conflicts over children, only adults argue about their rights to the child, but no one talks about the child’s right to his parents. Mother and father argue about the right to raise a child. Russia, Finland, Norway, France are arguing about the right to have a child on their territory... All courts, all media, all diplomats and ombudsmen discuss only the rights of adults. No one is based on children's rights.

Meanwhile, according to Article 7 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, it is not the country that has the right to a child born on its territory, but the child has the right to the citizenship of the country in which he was born or the country of which his parents are citizens. It is not the country that has the right to the child, but the child that has the right to the country.

The same article 7 states that a child has the right, if possible, to know his parents. That is, you cannot put a dash in the “father” column, not only because you are deceiving the social security authorities and receiving extra benefits and payments, but because, first of all, you are deceiving the child.

When adults argue about which of them the child will live with, when countries argue about which country the child will be a citizen of, in these loud disputes, as a rule, the third and main party to the conflict is not taken into account - the child himself. At best, a judge in Russia will ask the child’s opinion, but only if the child is over ten years old. And this despite the fact that the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and Article 57 of the Family Code of the Russian Federation provide for the right of a child of any age to express his opinion when any issue affecting his interests is being resolved in the family. Moreover, no adult has the right to influence the formation of this opinion in an illegal way, that is, to put pressure on the child, scare, bribe and deceive.

In any legal proceedings concerning the fate of a child, he is the main party.

Valery Panyushkin,

Head of the Rusfond project "Law Attack"

Third party to the conflict