Transgender man in Japan asks court to recognize him as a father — The Japan Times
In Tokyo, Japan, a transgender man has filed a petition with a family court seeking to be legally recognized as the father of a child conceived using an egg retrieved from him. The lawsuit was filed with the Tokyo Family Court on behalf of the child, who is represented by the child's mother, The Japan Times reports.
The man is in his 40s and lives in Tokyo. At the time the eggs were retrieved, he was legally registered as a woman. One of the eggs was fertilized with donor sperm and transferred to his partner, who gave birth to the child in November 2024.
District authority's refusal
The month after the child was born, the man was legally recognized as male, and in February 2025 the couple married. They later applied to a Tokyo district authority for recognition of paternity, but the application was rejected.
According to the case materials, the authority said that under current legislation there is no legally recognized relationship between a father and a child in the usual sense — one originating from sperm. Formally, the plaintiff in the case is the child, while the child's mother acts as the legal representative.
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Under Japan's Civil Code, the legal mother of a child is generally considered to be the woman who gave birth to the child. If a child is born in a marriage, the mother's husband is usually considered the father. If legal gender recognition and the marriage had taken place before the child's birth, the man would generally be considered the child's father, even without a biological connection through sperm.
Legal status of the father
In this case, the child was born before the man's legal gender recognition and before the marriage was concluded. The family says that as a result, he does not have the status of one of the parents, although he is genetically related to the child and plans to raise the child. The man also expressed concern about a situation in which his wife would be unable to care for the child.
In June 2024, Japan's Supreme Court ruled that a child born outside marriage may seek legal recognition of a transgender woman who provided sperm for conception as the father. The court then said that the Civil Code does not require a legal father to be male and noted the child's rights to support and inheritance. The court must now decide whether a legally recognized man can be a father if the genetic connection to the child comes from an egg.
