An Italian court ruled this Tuesday (5) that children can have two mothers mentioned on their birth certificate, a victory for defenders of the rights of the LGBTQIA+ community.
The court in Padua, in northeastern Italy, rejected a request from the Public Prosecutor’s Office that asked municipal authorities to retroactively eliminate the names of non-parental mothers from the certificates of 37 children who were born between 2017 and the start of the process.
“It’s wonderful news,” Michele Giarratano, a lawyer representing 15 of the affected children, told AFP.
If the Prosecutor’s Office’s request had been accepted, these mothers would have lost all rights over the minors in the event of the other mother’s death or separation.
However, the verdict can still be challenged by the Prosecutor’s Office or the Ministry of the Interior.
In a similar case, a court in northern Milan ruled in June that a birth certificate could contain the names of two mothers, but the ruling was overturned on appeal in February.
Italy legalized same-sex civil unions in 2016, but legislation on parental rights in same-sex families is unclear.
Over the years, Italy’s highest judicial body has asked Parliament several times to clarify this situation, without success.
Encouraged by several favorable decisions, several mayors have agreed in recent years to register both biological and non-biological parents on birth certificates.
But, in January 2023, the Ministry of the Interior of Giorgia Meloni’s ultraconservative government ordered mayors to stop transcribing the certificates of children born abroad through surrogacy, a practice prohibited in Italy.
The decision encouraged prosecutors across the country to question the records of children of same-sex couples, whether or not they were born through surrogacy.
Edition: AFP
Source: www.brasildefato.com.br
