Japan’s justices uphold sterilization to register gender change
Rights activists decry high court’s decision
TOKYO — Human rights and LGBT activists on Friday denounced a ruling by Japan’s Supreme Court upholding a law that effectively requires transgender people to be sterilized before they can have their gender changed on official documents.
The court said the law is constitutional because it was meant to reduce confusion in families and society. But it acknowledged that it restricts freedom and could become out of step with changing social values.
The 2004 law states that people wishing to register a gender change must have their original reproductive organs, including testes or ovaries, removed and have a body that “appears to have parts that resemble the genital organs” of the gender they want to register.
More than 7,800 Japanese have had their genders officially changed, according to Justice Ministry statistics cited by public broadcaster NHK.
The unanimous decision by a fourjudge panel, published Thursday, rejected an appeal by Takakito Usui, a transgender man who said forced sterilization violates the right to self-determination and is unconstitutional.
Usui, 45, appealed to the top court after he unsuccessfully requested that lower courts grant him legal recognition as male without having his female reproductive glands surgically removed.
Despite the unanimous decision, presiding justice Mamoru Miura joined another justice in saying that while the law may not violate the constitution, “doubts are undeniably emerging,” according to Usui’s lawyer, Tomoyasu Oyama.
The two judges proposed regular reviews of the law and appropriate measures “from the viewpoint of respect for personality and individuality,” according to Japanese media reports.
Japan is one of many countries with a sterilization requirement. In 2017, the European Court of Human Rights said 22 of the countries under its jurisdiction still required sterilization as part of a legal gender change, and it ordered them to end the practice.
The court’s decision ends Usui’s legal battle.
Human Rights Watch said the ruling was “incompatible with international human rights standards, goes against the times and deviates far from best global practices.” The New Yorkbased group said the ruling tolerates grave human rights violations against transgender people.
The ruling was also criticized by Japan’s LGBT community.