KARACHI: At least 708 boys and girls fell prey to forced and early marriages in Pakistan in the year 2013, which included 264 such cases in Punjab, 199 in Sindh, 143 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and 102 cases in Balochistan, said the founder of Madadgaar Helpline, Zia Ahmed Awan at a roundtable conference titled, ‘Addressing Gender Base […]

INDIA: Married six times in the past six years. This was what happened to a 17-year-old girl from Hafeezbabanagar, India who was forcibly married off by her parents, reported Malaysian Nanban. The girl was married off by her father, Mohammed Akhbar who owned a pawnshop, together with the help of his third wide Niloufer, sister Mehrun-nisa and a […]

A Malaysian court has sentenced a man to 12 years in jail for raping a child whom he later married. The district court in Sabah state, Borneo island, found former restaurant manager Riduan Masmud, 41, guilty of raping the 12-year-old in February last year, his lawyer, Ram Singh, said. The father of four was charged with rape shortly […]

Police are targeting a secret network of travel agents, money lenders, doctors and taxi drivers who help female genital mutilation happen in Britain, it emerged today. Officers believe the network is allowing the brutal practice to continue under the radar as thousands of girls in the UK remain at risk.  The crime ring uses doctors […]

A 14-YEAR-OLD girl was forced into an Islamic marriage with a western Sydney drug gang member who raped and beat her and later physically abused their daughter. Details of the now 25-year old victim’s ordeal surfaced in the Federal Circuit Court where the victim was fighting to have the man banned from seeing their daughter. […]

Forced marriages of underage girls might be commonplace in certain communities in Sydney, according to the NSW Minister for Community Services, Pru Goward, who spoke yesterday following the arrest of a 26-year-old man charged with 25 counts of sexual intercourse with a 13-year-old girl. The man, who for legal reasons cannot be named, allegedly met the […]

The issue of forced marriages is back in the spotlight in Australia, following reports that an imam in New South Wales allegedly married a 12-year-old girl to a 26-year-old man. The imam’s been charged with solemnisation of a marriage by an unauthorised person, while the 26-year-old has been charged with multiple counts of having sex with […]

(BBC) — One in five UK police forces is failing to properly record cases of so-called honour violence against women, according to a support group. It said there was a “postcode lottery” when it came to recording such crimes. The report, from the Iranian and Kurdish Women’s Rights Organisation (IKWRO), also highlighted a lack of proper […]

A teenage girl missing since she flew to Pakistan with her younger sisters may have been forced to marry, a High Court judge has heard. Alyssa Din, 16, and her sisters Safia, five, and Amani, four – all from Preston – have been missing since flying to Karachi via Islamabad in October. Their parents Ilyas […]