DESK REVIEW ON POPULATIONS AT RISK OF STATELESSNESS • 1914 Koseki Law, art. 44 (Law No. 26 of 30 March); • 1947 (current) Koseki Law, art. 6, 18, 22 (Law No. 224 of 22 December). • In the postwar period, three other laws relating to population registration were established to further supplement regulation and control; the Basic Resident Register Law (1967), the Resident Registration Law (1951) and the Alien Registration Law (1952). • Japan’s Nationality Act only recognised patrilineal descent until 1985 when an amendment was introduced recognizing matrilineal descent. The koseki registers only Japanese nationals, thus, nationality and family registration are closely linked. Creation of a person’s koseki leads to the recognition by the State of the existence of the person, their residence, protection of their rights, and the provision of administrative services, and the koseki subsequently chronologically documents the person’s status from birth to death. For example, while in other countries a marriage certificate may prove that a person was married to a particular person on a particular date, it may be more difficult to prove that one is still married; but in Japan, such events must be registered to have legal effect, so the koseki always provides proof of the family’s current situation (along with a complete historical record).208 If a person cannot prove his or her Japanese nationality due to a lack of entry in the family registry, that person is not only a person without a koseki but is also at risk of statelessness. The consequences of lacking a koseki are varied and can include: one’s name not being listed in the Resident Record; difficulty accessing compulsory education; not receiving various notices such as those related to entrance into the school system; lack of access to health insurance; lack of access to medical services, such as infant and child medical care and mother and child health care; no way to exercise the right to vote; difficulty opening a bank account or having a mobile phone contract; and difficulty securing any identification documents including a passport. The non-existence of a koseki can also affect employment, and be an obstacle to marriage, or be passed on to children with difficulty registering one’s children’s birth. Under the Nationality Act, children acquire Japanese nationality automatically at the time of their birth if their mother or father possess Japanese nationality at that time, though this fact may not be recorded in the koseki, raising issues of proof. Even if a child has acquired Japanese nationality under Article 2 of the Nationality Act, if the parents do not submit notification of birth, then the person will be without a family register. A person can petition Karl Jakob Krogness, Jus Koseki: Household registration and Japanese citizenship 戸籍主義 戸籍と日本国籍, Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus, Volume 12, Issue 35, Number 1, 29 August 2014, available at: https://apjjf.org/2014/12/35/Karl-JakobKrogness/4171/article.html. 208 UNHCR / April 2021 69