Divorced Japanese in Japan but not in home country: Does it nullify marriage again in Japan?

3 comments

1. It should be recognised abroad if you get it translated and your Embassy subsequently certifies it is an accurate translation and stamps both documents.

   As for marriage, since records are not passed between countries and since you can’t prove that you are not married in every other country in the world when you marry in Japan you need to swear and affidavit at your embassy that you are single. The Embassy will then provide you with a “certificate of no impediment (to marriage” which is suitable to take to the Japanese city office.

2. I think it would help people to know your home country.

   Eg. I know from personal experience there is no issue for Australia.

3. The procedure will be different for each country, you will have to ask your embassy for details.

   My experience:

   * Married in Japan then registered marriage in France through embassy – it gets written down as an addendum to my birth certificate
   * Later divorced
   * Since to get remarried in Japan (or anywhere else really) I need a certificate of legal capacity to marry from my embassy and they will check if I am registered as being married in France, I needed to get my divorce registered which required sending a translation of the Japanese divorce certificate to a court in France that rubber stamps it – again, the divorce is written down in my birth certificate
   * Got remarried with certificate from embassy

   I have a friend who divorced his wife then they got back together and remarried. He still had to get the divorce registered in France before he could get remarried even if it was the same girl. Added stress was that they had a time limit to get all the paperwork processed as she was pregnant with their 3rd kid and they needed to get remarried asap or else their last kid would forever be marked as bastard in the Japanese koseki…