Today, there are approximately 340,000 refugees from Ukraine in the Czech Republic who have been granted temporary protection. The war divided many families, others fell apart under the weight of the events, and the legal problems are then resolved by the Czech courts. “It’s something the system will have to deal with for a long time,” said Jakub Lorenc from the Office for the International Protection of Children. The office focuses on the social and legal protection of children in relation to foreign countries, and Lorenc is an expert in the area of Ukraine.
Already in 2002, the Czech Republic and Ukraine negotiated a bilateral agreement on legal assistance in civil matters, in addition to this, lawyers can also follow the Hague Convention from 1996, which was accepted by both the Czech Republic and Ukraine. Ukrainians can thus turn to the Czech courts, but it has its own specifics.
“For example, according to the aforementioned bilateral agreement, the Czech court can decide on the divorce of Ukrainian citizens, but both must be present. A typical example is that a woman comes here with children and her husband stays in Ukraine. In such a case, the Czech court cannot make a decision and the matter must be resolved by the Ukrainian court,” described Lorenc.
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“A layman would think that when we are in the Czech Republic, decisions will always be made according to Czech law. This is often not the case,” Lorenc described. The case is the determination of paternity, when our courts decide according to Ukrainian law, if the child was born in Ukraine.
“In Ukraine, for example, it is not possible for the father not to be listed on the birth certificate. If, based on the consent of both parents, the biological father is not registered, the mother’s surname and the names given by her will be entered in the birth certificate,” explained the expert. Sometimes a woman gives her father’s name, which was initially confusing for the Czech authorities.
In a number of disputes about children, both Czech and Ukrainian courts can decide. “If one parent started a lawsuit in Ukraine and the other in the Czech Republic, the one who started first has priority and the other should stop. Legally it is clear, practically it has a number of problems,” described Lorenc.
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He also commented on the sensitive issue of child abduction, the resolution of which is governed by the 1980 Convention on International Child Abduction. consent of the other. It was almost impossible to kidnap a child. After the Russian aggression, the border regime relaxed and many mothers took advantage of that, and that’s putting it mildly,” described Lorenc. According to him, in ninety percent of cases such abductions are committed by mothers.
“Two cases have already reached the Municipal Court in Brno. In both cases it was decided not to return the child. The rule is that the child should be returned unless one of the exceptions is met. One of them is that returning would put the child at risk of serious harm,” the expert described.
According to him, his office dealt with a fraction of these kidnapping cases. In a number of them, the parent with the abducted child moves from the Czech Republic to another European country.
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