The Strasbourg Court has validated the French regulations that allows a mother to give a child up for adoption under the condition that her identity is not communicated to the child as long as she wants, even after her death.

In a ruling published this Tuesday, European judges conclude that France did not violate the rights of a woman, who is now 72 years old, who is denied the identity of her biological mother, who took advantage of that legislation regarding her anonymity when she gave her up for adoption at birth, and who continues to refuse now to be told who she is.

The Strasbourg Court recognizes that the rights and interests of the two parties are “difficult to reconcile.” But he insists that France has a margin of appreciation, and that in the case of Annick Cherrier’s demand to know her origins, her refusal to give him the name of who gave her up for adoption has not broken “the fair balance” between his rights and those of his biological mother.

Cherrier, born in 1952, did not know until 2008, after the death of her parents, that she was adopted, and He then requested that the Administration inform him of the identity of his biological parents.. The National Council for Personal Origins (CNAOP) accessed this information and then contacted the biological parents.

Both reiterated that they wanted to maintain their anonymity. before that daughter even after dying. A decision that, as the CNAOP pointed out, could be reversed. The plaintiff was not satisfied with that answer and appealed to the French Justice, which did not agree with her either.

The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) had already validated in previous rulings the principle of the regulations that exist in France and Italy that allows women to give birth while preserving their anonymity in the face of children given up for adoption.

The Court emphasizes in this new opinion that in the French case There have been two reforms in 2002 and 2009 about the reversibility of that measure if the mother changes her mind.

In this regard, remember that the French Council of State justified in 2019 the purpose of the first of these reforms, which established “a conciliation procedure” to make “a compromise between the rights and interests” of each other and that the Constitutional Council has also declared the device in accordance with the Magna Carta.