Beijing court improves handling of domestic disputes

A Beijing court has outlined various measures it has taken to better deal with a rapidly growing number of domestic disputes, so that it can help keep family harmony and maintain social stability by rule of law.

The Beijing Dongcheng District People's Court issued a report on Friday showing that it heard 6,846 domestic cases from January 2020 to June this year, of which, 6,558 have been concluded. The majority of them were related to inheritance disputes, followed by divorce and child custody cases, according to the report.

To strengthen protection of those who suffer from domestic violence, the court issued 32 personal safety protection orders over the past three years, in an effort to implement China's Anti-Domestic Violence Law, it added.

Considering domestic disputes happen between family members, "we tried our best to mediate the cases at the beginning," Wang Xiaofeng, deputy chief judge of the court's No 2 civil adjudication tribunal, said while explaining the report.

The number of domestic disputes successfully concluded through mediation was rising, he added.

When handling inheritance cases, "we visited places ofhukou, or household registration, of the litigants involved to get more information about their family relationships, and worked with household registration centers to figure out how many properties the litigants owned," he said.

The court has also joined hands with women's federations and the district's civil affairs department to exchange information about marriage registrations in order to help judges solve disputes as quickly as possible, he said.

In addition, "we've visited schools to understand what children involved in the divorce cases are thinking about to prevent them from being further harmed by their parents' conflicts and ensure they grow up healthy," he added.

On Friday, the court disclosed eight influential domestic disputes, including those relating to domestic violence, child custody, and taking elder care.