During latest 10 years, the political and social situation has been changing enormously in Northeast Asia, where there are South and North Korea, Japan, China, Taiwan and Russia and so on. In this area, their mutual connection and improvement is increasing, so I believe that this area will be the uniform community, especially in economic and legal relations, in the near future.
In past time a little after World War II, it was very difficult to visit each other countries because of the different political situations in this area. Especially Korea was divided in South and North Korea, in capitalist society and communist society. And china was also divided in Communist China and Taiwan. So it was very difficult for South Korean people to visit North Korea and Communist China(now China) and for past some time, the Korean People in Japan had the difficulties to come back to South Korea. But nowadays, the situation has been changed, the chances to meet or to reunite the separated families are increasing. Thus the possibility to the problems of the bigamy or the claim for the inheritance right become open, and we have to prepare the ways to solve the problems. And I study about the bigamy and the claim for the inheritance which are going to be rising after the family reunion in this area.
I think that we need the principles to settle that problems. In solving the problems, we have to (1) Under Humanism(人道主義), (2) Respect Mutual (相互尊重主義), (3) Revere the acquired Rights(旣得權 尊重主義), (4) According to the mutual expression of intention(意思表示 尊重原則), (5) Under the Rationalism, making the Procedures(節次的 合理主義).
In the problem of the bigamy, we don’t have to apply the present Korean civil law and other counties’s present civil laws. Korea Civil Law Act Article 810 provides the prohibition of bigamy, saying like that "A person who has a spouse may not be allowed to enter into another marriage". And also, the Article 818 former paragraph provides the claim for annulment of bigamy, and that is "In the case of marriage in violation of the provisions of Article 810, a claim for annulment of the marriage to the court may be made by either party, their spouse, lineal ascendants or collateral blood relatives within the eighth degree of relationship, or a public prosecutor". Then thinking under the previous principles, these provisions are not proper to the bigamy in Northeast Asia because according to these provisions, one of two marriages has to be annulled and this settlement is not proper under humanism.
So I think that we don’t have to select one of two marriages, and we have to approve all of them. And after that, we have to make the systems to mediate the problems and to give the property to the spouse who will be separated. And we have to make the law to solve the problems and to establish arbitration center to settle the disputes.
And we also protect the inheritance right of the Korean people who live in North Korea and China for a long time. There are so many separated families in Northeast Asia and especially in South and North Korea. We are expecting Korean unification, so we have to prepare the several ways to get our integration. I think it is important to protect the inheritance right of North Korean people to get the integration. For solving these problems, we have to make the law and have to establish the Trust Agency which will be able to administrate the inheritance properties of them.
In Northeast Asia, I think that we have to respect each other and cooperate each other. And we have to prepare the laws and legal systems to solve the bigamy and protect the inheritance right in this Northeast Asia, and also in North and South Korea.