Japan's parliament on Tuesday enacted a set of bills to digitalize civil procedures that do not involve lawsuits, such as divorce mediation and bankruptcy applications.
The House of Representatives passed the bills by a majority vote at the day's plenary meeting, with support mainly from the ruling bloc. The bills were approved by the the Upper House earlier.
The legislation will allow people to submit necessary applications online, instead of the current system of such documents being brought or mailed to courts. Online submission is mandatory for lawyers and other proxies.
Online submission is also allowed for documents related to partition of property and civil execution such as seizures and auctions of debtors' assets by courts as part of bankruptcy procedures.
Documents submitted in paper form will be digitized and kept by courts. Such data can be viewed online at home or other locations.
The legislation also allows participation at meetings of creditors of bankrupt companies through the internet.
In May last year, the parliament enacted a civil procedure law amendment allowing the entire civil lawsuit proceedings to be executed online.