HCCH Halts 15-Year Surrogacy Treaty Push as Experts Warn More Babies Risk Statelessness
Updated
Updated · The Guardian · Jul 19
HCCH Halts 15-Year Surrogacy Treaty Push as Experts Warn More Babies Risk Statelessness
1 articles · Updated · The Guardian · Jul 19
Summary
A 15-year Hague effort to create global rules on parentage in surrogacy cases has been suspended, with experts warning the gap leaves more children born through cross-border arrangements at risk of statelessness.
Prof Michael Hellner said deep splits among member states — from countries permitting surrogacy to those seeking bans — made agreement impossible, even as overseas surrogacy keeps expanding.
In the UK, surrogacy births have more than doubled since 2015 to over 981 in 2025, mostly abroad, and intended parents can face court fights over parental orders and citizenship for their children.
Experts said babies can fall into legal limbo when neither the birth country nor the destination country recognizes the surrogacy arrangement or grants nationality automatically, creating "limping parentage" across borders.
The collapse of the HCCH process sharpens a wider fight between campaigners seeking abolition over exploitation concerns and agencies arguing tighter international regulation is needed because demand is rising fast.
As more countries ban international surrogacy, where will the booming global demand go, and who will be most at risk?
Can 'ethical' international surrogacy truly exist, or is it a myth that masks inherent global inequalities and exploitation?
With global rules stalled, how can a child's right to a legal identity be guaranteed when nations disagree on their creation?
The 2026 Hague Surrogacy Treaty Collapse: Deep Divisions, Legal Fragmentation, and the Human Cost
Overview
In March 2026, the Hague Conference on Private International Law (HCCH) suspended its 15-year effort to create an international convention on legal parentage in cross-border surrogacy cases, marking a global stalemate in family law. This decision resulted from deep and fundamental divisions among member states, with irreconcilable and profound disagreements over the ethics, regulation, and legality of surrogacy. Some countries support regulated surrogacy as a human right, while others see it as a violation and call for a ban. These vastly divergent perspectives made consensus impossible, leaving families and children in legal uncertainty and without international protection.