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Transgender woman in Japan sues over right to change listed sex in family registry

Dec 04 (Japan Times) - A 52-year-old in Hyogo Prefecture filed a claim on Tuesday over the constitutionality of a law that blocks those with children who are minors from changing their sex in the official family registry.

In the claim, filed with the Amagasaki branch of the Kobe Family Court, a contract worker who has an eight-year-old daughter, sought to change her listed sex in the family registry from male to female.

The woman has already relinquished custody of the girl. She had sex reassignment surgery this year.

“It’s unreasonable that I can’t change my sex (in the family registry) because of my child,” the person said at a news conference in Amagasaki after filing the claim.

A provision of the special law on gender identity disorder requires that an individual not have a child who is a minor in order to change their sex for the family registry.

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