The High Court has ordered the return to Japan of a four-year-old child who was brought to Ireland by his father in October 2025 without the consent of his mother.
Ms Justice Nuala Jackson ruled on April 16 that the child, identified only as P, had been habitually resident in Japan and should be returned there under the Hague Convention on international child abduction.
The child's parents, identified as U.V. and Y.Z., married in 2021 but had lived separately since about April 2024. The father moved with P to another part of Japan after the mother was admitted to hospital for mental health treatment. She was discharged in June 2024 after treatment, with medical material before the court recording improvement in her condition.
The mother continued seeing P until August 2025. The father argued that she had later stopped exercising custody rights and also claimed that returning P to Japan would expose him to physical or psychological harm or an intolerable situation.
The court rejected both arguments. Ms Justice Jackson found that contemporaneous messages showed the mother repeatedly seeking greater contact with P and objecting to restrictions on access. The judge said the father's communications often made contact conditional on financial payments and did not support his claim that he had encouraged access which the mother voluntarily rejected.
The court also found that the high threshold for the Hague Convention's grave-risk defence had not been met. It considered incidents involving the mother's mental ill health but noted that she had received inpatient treatment and later medical evidence stated that she was capable of caring for P.
The ruling does not decide longer-term custody or access arrangements. Those issues are for the appropriate authorities in Japan. The High Court directed that P be returned without delay and listed the case for April 21 to address the timing and practical arrangements for the return.