On January 2, the Shandong Provincial High Court of the Communist Party of China published an article on its WeChat official account titled “You cannot request a divorce only on the grounds of “derailment”.” The article pointed out, “Even if you catch evidence of your spouse going out and opening a house with another opposite sex, this is not a long-term cohabitation and cannot be used to ask for a divorce.”
The article explains that, according to the judicial interpretation of the Civil Code·Marriage and Family Edition issued by the Supreme Court on December 29, 2020, the legal condition for divorce is “bigamy or cohabitation with another person”. At the same time, “bigamy or cohabitation with another person” is also considered Conditions for divorce damages.
The article pointed out that even if one party in a marriage cheats on the opposite sex outside of marriage, “but without long-term and stable cohabitation, it cannot be regarded as cohabitation, and it cannot be used as a reason to sue for divorce, and it cannot be used as a claim for divorce damages. conditions of”.
In response to a netizen’s question: “I caught evidence of my husband’s derailment and went to the court to sue for divorce. Why?” The article pointed out, “That’s because the evidence only proves that your spouse has acted disloyally, but you didn’t. It proves that your spouse is cohabiting with others, and it does not prove that your relationship has broken down.”
The article mentioned that from the Civil Code and the latest judicial interpretations, “the latest attitude of the law to divorce is to prevent reckless divorce.” On the one hand, the law adds a 30-day divorce cooling-off period to the registration of divorce; the other is Regarding litigation for divorce, “derailment is excluded from the statutory conditions of divorce” in a judicial interpretation. “Only when the betrayal marriage is serious enough to be bigamy or continuous and long-term living together with others, and there is sufficient evidence to prove it, Only then can a divorce be sentenced.”
After the article went online, it caused an uproar, and netizens criticized the government for having reached the point of unscrupulous means in order to promote birth: “It’s all cheated, unfaithful, and relationship breakup? Is it possible to hurt each other to die and the lamp to die is the only way to break the relationship?”, “The more It’s too much. There is a cooling-off period for divorce. Now cheating is not a reason for divorce. Why don’t you go back to feudal society and agree to accept concubines.” “After reading this article, I feel that I am not living in the 21st century. Divorce, one word, difficult”, “When you made the law, you were thinking about how to prevent divorce. Have you ever thought that it will prevent many people from getting married?”, “Although marriage is not for divorce, but now you see divorce It’s such a horror. I really have to be cautious about getting married again and again.
The article caused constant controversy, and it appeared in the hot search on Weibo that day. Under the pressure of public opinion, the Shandong Higher People’s Court also deleted the controversial article.
According to The Paper, Xin Jinguo, a senior marriage lawyer and partner of Beijing Zhongwen Law Firm, posted an article on Weibo to refute the article’s statement. He mentioned, “Think about it carefully, then the other party can blatantly cheat. Isn’t this bullying? The other party has cheated and can’t ask for a divorce? It shows how absurd this statement is.”
Xin Jinguo mentioned that the two concepts of “cannot ask for a divorce” and “cannot judge for divorce” are not a slight difference. The former is a manifestation of litigation rights, and the latter is a manifestation of divorce rights, just like license plate lottery “eligible to participate in lottery lottery” There is still some distance from “whether it can be shaken”.
He mentioned that, in fact, even if there is no infidelity, even if the spouse is only emotionally discordant, “Either party has the right to file a divorce lawsuit in the court.” However, Xin Jinguo also pointed out that “Whether the divorce is approved or not requires further trial by the court. “.
Many netizens described the official method of preventing divorce as “incidental behavior.” In fact, in recent years, the Chinese Communist government has faced serious population problems. It has tried every means to introduce various new policies to encourage young people to get married and have children and prevent couples from divorcing. However, the results have been minimal and even aroused disgust among some people. According to statistics from the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, China’s elderly population will exceed 300 million in the next five years. Except for the “increasing age” of society, the birth rate, marriage rate and divorce rate are not optimistic.
In 2020, the number of newborns in China was 10.35 million, the lowest level since 1949; 8.131 million pairs of marriage registrations nationwide, a decrease of 12.2% from 2019; the number of divorce registrations soared from 580,000 pairs in 1987 to 3.73 million pairs in 2020 .
Radio Free Asia quoted senior media person Wang Jian as analyzing that China’s implementation of the childbirth policy for nearly 40 years has not only changed the demographic structure, but also changed people’s views on marriage. He said: “Now the people of marriageable age are just the first batch of children born to family planning parents, so there are fewer people of marriageable age. Young people are studying more, and they are still going to graduate school after undergraduate, so they don’t want to be so early. Marriage, so the age of marriage has been postponed, and the conditions for marriage have increased. It is also a house, a car, and a bride price.”
Wang Jian also said that another very important reason is that the economic pressure is too great, which is a very heavy straw that “crushes” modern marriages. He said: “The core problem is still the house. A couple, basically six wallets to buy a house, the money left after the house is almost moonlight, the fragile economic situation leads to the fragility of the family situation. One of the reasons for the rising divorce rate It is the house purchase restriction. If two people are divorced, they can buy an extra house. Many people have no plans to buy a house, so they will divorce first.”
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