Italian prosecutor: Child cannot have two mothers
Mother and her child walk on an empty stone bridge during a hot day. Image is not related to the article. Photo EPA, Georgi Licovslki
Southern Europe
In Italy, 33 children may lose the validity of their birth certificate. The reason? A public prosecutor believes the law does not allow children to have two mothers.
Valeria Sanzari, the public prosecutor of the Italian town of Padua, challenged the birth certificates issued by Mayor Sergio Giordani between 2017 and now. She demands that the name of the non-biological is removed from the documents, Reuters reports.
The specific case is about a five-year-old girl of a 40-year-old couple that married abroad. She has a double last name, but the prosecutor now demands that the name of her non-biological mother is removed. However, the biological mother of the girl argues that this would be "a personal trauma in a delicate phase of development to lose a brother (the son of her other mother) and a mother". That is reported by Avennire.
Legislation
However, more than thirty other families have received a letter with the same demand from the public prosecutor. "With the current legislation, I can't do anything else", she says. In addition, she argues that the children in question are still young, so even if they have to change their surname, this would not have any repercussions on their social life.
The court of Padua will rule on the issue later this year, Reuters expects.
Medical decisions
Newspaper Repubblica is critical of the move of the persecutor. It points out that non-biological parents will no longer be able to pick up their children from school, unless they have a signed document from the biological mother. In addition, they can no longer take medical decisions.
Politician Alessandro Zan writes on Twitter that the decision of the prosecutor "orphans children of a mother by decree."
The demand from the public prosecutor came a few months after Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni ordered mayors and city councils to stop registering children of same-sex parents. However, because Italy lacked clear legislation for a while, some courts have allowed spouses to adopt the children of their spouse. Some mayors, like the one from Padua, have even gone as far as registering both same-sex parents on the birth certificate.
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