Child born at sea can be registered in Malta, court finds

The mother of a baby born on a migrant boat back in November 2008 has been granted the right to register her child in Malta.?
Chana Hatra gave birth to her daughter Muna while on a boat that left Libya with 67 migrants. Just after her daughter was born, a Russian boat rescued the migrants and brought them to Malta.?
Ms Hatra's initial attempt to register her child in Malta was refused by the Director of the Public Registry, prompting a series of legal challenges and years of court sittings which have now finally come to a conclusion.?
Muna is now 8 years old and lives with her mother in France. The mother and daughter had left Malta in July 2009 as part of a migrant sharing initiative.?
In its ruling, the Court of Appeal cited a 2015 amendment to the Civil Code which states that the Public Registry can register a child for humanitarian reasons if they are born at sea on an unregistered boat, provided Malta is the first form of disembarkation after birth.
The Civil Code amendment was introduced after the Emigrants' Commission had written to the Ombudsman in November 2012 about the matter, with its applications to have Muna Hatra registered in Malta having previously been rejected...

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