Man fails in bid to disown IVF child

A man whose ex-wife impregnated herself without his consent using previously-stored sperm from failed IVF treatment unsuccessfully sought to disown his son, in an unprecedented court case.

The man argued he was not the father of the child because the woman did not obtain his permission before conceiving the baby.

The former couple, a European woman and an Arab man whose case was heard before the Abu Dhabi court, divorced after the stress of years of attempting to conceive, naturally and through IVF treatment. However, after the divorce had been finalised, the woman again visited the Abu Dhabi clinic which had earlier stored the couple’s reproductive material, and underwent a further round of IVF treatment, without the knowledge of her husband — which this time proved to be successful.

Upon conception, the woman visited her former husband to tell him he would soon be a father. Far from a happy reception, the shocked ex-husband told the woman he had begun a new life and neither needed or wanted her or a baby with her. Once the child was born, and on her ex-husband’s refusal to recognise the baby as his biological son, the woman sought court help to corroborate the baby’s parentage.

Before the personal status court, the man accepted the baby was his biological son but said it was nevertheless not enough for filiation — the legal term recognising the relationship of father and son.

“To be a father is not necessarily to be something hereditary, yet it is something that ties one’s soul and heart together, which is something I miss as I feel nothing towards that baby,” the man told the court.

While he had previously spent much time, energy and money in the efforts of starting a family with the woman, he said he did not want her nor the child any more, especially after they had exchanged insults. The court looked to the words of Muslim scholars, as there was no prior precedent for the case. Scholars had earlier given edicts that a baby born as a result of IVF, where no marital life exists, is considered an illegitimate baby.

However, the court decided the present case was different as the the eggs and sperm were taken from the couple when the marital life was still unbroken, and the fertilisation was made during the Iddat period, the grace period in Islam during which a man can still retract a divorce.

The court ruled the child should bear no responsibility for his parent’s disputes and had a right to belong to both a father and a mother. Accordingly, the court ruled that the man was the father of the child, a verdict upheld by the Court of Appeal. The court also ordered the father to pay the child support and provide a home where the mother can take care of the child.

The father then filed a lawsuit in the criminal court against his ex-wife and the hospital that performed the IVF without his consent, violating the law.

However, the public prosecution and criminal court said the case was in actual fact a civil case and it acquitted both the child’s mother and the hospital. The court recommended the father pursue prosecution through a civil court if he wished to attain compensation.

Published in cooperation with the Abu Dhabi Judicial Department.

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