Legal: The missing person is considered dead after a year of searching for him by a court ruling

An Arab woman confused between a missing husband in Ukraine and a promised groom

An Arab woman was confused when news of her missing husband in Ukraine was cut off, and she did not know if he was alive or dead, while her cousin proposed to her family to marry her on the grounds that her husband was dead, wondering about the legal situation in such a case, and if she accepted By marrying the promised groom, it was later revealed that her husband was still alive.

This came as part of legal awareness sessions presented by Legal Counsel, Dr. Youssef Al-Sharif, through the pages of "Emirates Today" to shed light on the Personal Status Law and the new articles in it.

Al-Sharif said that he had received a message from a woman saying, “She is from an Arab country, she is 25 years old, and she married her cousin, four years ago, and she came to the country with her husband for work and residence.”

The questioner said that her husband got to know a Ukrainian engineer a year ago, through his work, and provided him with a good job there, and after his travels, “He kept in contact with her always, but when the last war broke out there, he sent her a message on (WhatsApp), telling her about it. He will leave Ukraine because the situation there is not safe, and since then you have not known anything about him, and whether he is still in this country or has left it, and whether he is alive or dead.”

She indicated that a cousin had previously had a desire to marry her before her marriage, but that did not happen, and he has recently started to spread among family and relatives that her husband died during the war in this country, and he will not return, and raises their fears of her staying alone in exile, which is She is young, and finally asked her to marry her father, which left her in amazement and confusion. How could she marry when she was already married?

She stated that her father told her that he was convinced that her husband was dead, and that she had the right to marry someone else, and she had to accept her cousin, wondering about the validity of this saying, and could she marry under these circumstances?

And what is the legal situation if she accepts the marriage and then it turns out that her husband is still alive.

For his part, Dr. Youssef Al-Sharif confirmed that the law differentiates between the absent and the missing, and the questioner must understand the difference between them, in order to determine her appropriate behavior, and what to do if she agrees to marry, and later discovers that her husband is still alive.

Al-Sharif explained that the absent is the person whose location is unknown, and we know that he is alive and communicates with his family by phone or other means.

He pointed to the questioner saying that her husband told her that he would leave Ukraine, but she does not know if he left her or not, so he is missing and not absent, adding that if the missing person overcomes the circumstances of his loss, such as the case of the questioner’s husband in a country where war has spread, she can go directly To the court and file a case, asking the judge to take measures to search for him, and after a year of losing him, he will be judged as dead, but if he was missing in normal circumstances, meaning he was not overpowered by his death or death, the period would be four years, not a year, and from the date of the ruling as dead, it is considered and after The waiting period can marry someone else, and if it turns out after that that the missing husband who was sentenced to death is still alive, she shall return to him if she is not married or if her second husband has not consummated the marriage, but if he has consummated, she shall not return to her former husband.

Al-Sharif continued: “But when is it necessary for a woman to return to the first husband, even if the second consort with her?

Responding, this is binding when the second husband knows that the first is still alive and deliberately hides this information from the wife and people in order to achieve his purpose of marrying her, and also the wife returns to the husband sentenced to death if she is within the waiting period in which the judge ruled.

He pointed out that the case is brought by the questioner in the Sharia court in the emirate in which she resides and the litigants are the potential heirs, meaning that assuming that her husband died, in this case she must search for his heirs, so that they are the litigants in the lawsuit.

He stated that in the event that the questioner has children from her husband, she will sue the guardian, if any, or the guardian over them, according to the circumstances, and this is what Article (12) of the UAE Personal Status Law stipulates: and his representative, or whoever appointed an agent on his behalf, and to the Public Prosecution.”

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