Die Einwirkung der Europäischen Konvention für Menschenrechte auf das Internationale Privatrecht am Beispiel der Rezeption der Kafala in Europa Besprechung der Entscheidung des EGMR Nr. 43631/09 vom 4.10.2012, Harroudj ./. Frankreich

On 4 October 2012, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) rendered a decision dealing with Kafala. This Islamic law-based institution is an undertaking of an adult person to support and educate a minor without creating a formal parent-child relationship. Since adoption, as understood in western legal systems, is prohibited in most Muslim jurisdictions, Kafala is employed as a substitute. The Court considered the French conflicts-of-law rule (Art. 370–3 para. 2 of the Civil Code) prohibiting adoption of foreign children whose national laws prohibit the institution as compatible with Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights. This essay considers the decision of the Court as a positive contribution to the issue of the impact of Human Rights on private international law. After recalling briefly the general terms of the relationship between human rights and private international law, the essay examines the status of Kafala outside and inside the European context. It also deals with the reception of Kafala in France. The Court considered that a relationship founded on the Kafala may be protected under Article 8 of the Convention if requirements of continuity and stability are met. Nevertheless it recalled that Article 8 contains no right to adoption. This position of the Court is in line with its case-law on similar issues: given relationships should be protected as part of the respect of family life. The court however did not recognize any right of the applicant to convert the relationship in question into a determined legal relationship such as a parent-child-relationship. Two arguments were decisive for the decision of the court: lack of consensus among state-parties concerning the reception or the status of Kafala and recognition of Kafala by the relevant international instruments as a suitable alternative to adoption. As far as the first point is concerned the essay contends that the Court was mistaken in its appraisal of other state-parties regulations on Kafala as only France specifically prohibits the conversion of Kafala to adoption.