International Child Abduction Act since Its Enactment

Ms Ellen Lee asked the Minister for Social and Family Development since the enactment of the International Child Abduction Act (a) which are the contracting states that the central authority has been in contact with to request the return of a child; (b) what difficulties has the central authority encountered; and (c) how many countries have yet to agree to reciprocate in giving due recognition to Singapore as a contracting state and which countries are these.

Ms Ellen Lee asked the Minister for Social and Family Development (a) since the enactment of the International Child Abduction Act on 1 March 2011, how many cases have applied to the central authority for assistance to return a child; (b) what are the nationality, habitual place of residence, gender, age and occupation respectively of these applicants, their spouses and their children; (c) how many cases are successful and unsuccessful respectively and what are the reasons; and (d) what is the average time that the applicants have to wait before their children are returned to them.

Mr Chan Chun Sing: Since Singapore's accession to the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction in December 2010, 30 out of the 90 Contracting States have declared their acceptance of Singapore’s accession and entered into a Convention relationship with Singapore.

Since the enactment of the International Child Abduction Act in Singapore, the Singapore Central Authority (SCA) has handled four cases where the child was wrongfully removed from Singapore and one case where the child was wrongfully retained in Singapore. Most applicants and their children were of foreign nationalities. Countries involved include France, Germany, the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region and the United States of America. The cases were addressed within an average of about 2.5 months, in accordance with the Convention's objectives, namely, to secure the prompt return of children wrongfully removed to or retained in any Contracting State, and protecting the best interests of children.

The SCA also received requests from citizens of countries which were either not signatories to the Hague Convention or have yet to declare their acceptance of Singapore's accession to the Convention. For such requests, the SCA assisted by providing information on the legal process in Singapore, counselling services for those who required emotional support, and seeking information from the overseas central authorities on other options available for their citizens.

As a fairly new Contracting State, Singapore will continue to engage and learn from other jurisdictions on the best practices with regard to fulfilling the international obligations under the Convention.