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Posts Tagged ‘violence’

Syrian refugees forced to let Lebanese landlord marry their 14-year-old daughter because they cannot afford the rent

A 14-year-old girl who escaped the bloody fighting in Syria is being forced to marry a 44-year-old stranger in exchange for her family’s safe refuge across the border.

Hanifa Amar’s parents say they can no longer afford the $250 (£150) monthly rent at a house they fled to in neighbouring Lebanon. The landlord has agreed to let them stay, but only if Hanifa becomes his second wife.Wiping away tears, Hanifa told Al Jazeera: ‘My whole life is destroyed. I don’t want to marry him, but if I do my family can stay in this house.’

The teenager had hoped to marry her 22-year-old cousin, but he died fighting in Syria last year. Instead, she now has to take desperate measures to help her family survive after they were threatened with eviction. Her mother, Mysa, says they cannot risk moving into a tent because her husband suffers from heart problems and she fears her asthmatic son could die in the bitter cold.

Her other son, who is 12, earns the little money they have by helping a mechanic, but this is barely enough to pay for food. Mrs Amar said: ‘No mother wants to hurt her child, but we have no choice.’

Read More: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2539732/Syrian-refugees-forced-let-Lebanese-landlord-marry-14-year-old-daughter-afford-rent.html

Londoners are ‘morally ambiguous’ about forced marriage, experts warn

Too many young Londoners are  “morally ambiguous” about forced marriage and must be taught about human rights, campaigners warned today.

A new study of the views of young people from immigrant families found some believe forced marriage can be “good” for women and is done with their best interests at heart.

Researchers found that while the same group of young Londoners are against female genital mutilation, there is more acceptance of  forced marriage.

Naana Otoo-Oyortey, executive director of the charity FORWARD, which commissioned the report, said many people still support the supposed reasons why forced marriage happens, such as protecting virginity.

The report concluded that raising awareness of “the absolute nature of human rights” is vital in combatting both forced marriage and FGM. Ms Otoo-Oyortey said: “Notions of chastity were very strong even among those who say they are liberal”, and forced marriage was seen as “an acceptable way of stopping girls being  promiscuous.”

She added that people are now more willing to speak about female genital mutilation, but that forced marriage is the “new taboo.” Researchers questioned a group of 18- to 30-year-olds living in London whose families are from countries where FGM and forced marriage occur, including Iran, Afghanistan, Somalia, Sudan and Nigeria.

Read More: http://www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/londoners-are-morally-ambiguous-about-forced-marriage-experts-warn-9063627.html

 

 

Three expat sisters refuse to board plane to avoid forced marriage

The girls told the police they were born and lived in the UAE and were scared that their newly married father would force them to marry in Mauritania. 

Three young Mauritanian sisters who refused to travel to their home country because they feared being forced into marriage, were put up in the Dubai Women and Children’s Foundation after the General Department of Human Rights intervened.

The flight on which the girls were to travel on Tuesday was delayed as they refused to board the plane, but the situation was later resolved after the girls agreed that they would be accompanied by their estranged mother to their home country to live. Dr Mohammed Al Murr of the General Department of Human Rights said that an employee of the Immigration Department at the Dubai Police informed the Women and Children’s Protection Department of the Dubai Police about the three girls, aged 21, 15, and 12, who were allegedly being forced to travel back home to stay with other family members there.

The three girls told the police they were born in the UAE and spent their life here and were scared that their father would force them to marry in Mauritania. Their father, who has been in the UAE for 30 years, tried to send the girls back to their home country as he had recently married a new woman in Dubai, and said he couldn’t cope looking after her children as well as his own. Upon refusing to board the plane, the girls said they did not know their father’s family well enough and were scared to go and live with them.

The girls’ mother, who the father had divorced some years back, was living in Tanzania where she too married another man, but later divorced him.

Read More:http://www.khaleejtimes.com/kt-article-display-1.asp?xfile=data/nationgeneral/2013/December/nationgeneral_December95.xml&section=nationgeneral

Rights group says laws failing to protect girls from forced early marriages

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates – Cultural traditions and a lack of legal protections are driving tens of millions of girls around the world into early marriage, subjecting them to violence, poverty and mistreatment, an international human rights group says.

Equality Now, citing the United Nations Population Fund, said in a report issued over the weekend that more than 140 million girls over the next decade will be married before they turn 18. “When a young girl is married and gives birth, the vicious cycle of poverty, poor health, curtailed education, violence, instability, disregard for rule of law … continues into the next generation, especially for any daughters she may have,” the report said.

The 32-page report found that despite laws that set a minimum age for marriage in many countries, social norms continue to provide a veneer of legitimacy to child marriage in remote villages and even in developed countries. Child marriage is defined as a marriage before age 18.

“Child marriage legitimizes human rights violations and abuses of girls under the guise of culture, honour, tradition and religion,” the report said. The report gave examples of cases in countries such as Afghanistan, Cameroon, Guatemala, India, Jordan, Kenya, Malawi and Mali.

Often when child brides are married off to older men, it is to restore or maintain family honour, or to settle a father’s debts or obtain some other financial gain. A girl married off is seen as one less mouth to feed, and the wedding dowry is spent by her family to support itself.

Read more: http://www.ctvnews.ca/world/rights-group-says-laws-failing-to-protect-girls-from-forced-early-marriages-1.1646247#ixzz2qwY3IPtX

Partington man drags 18-year-old sister off bus hours after she she was granted a forced marriage protection order

A PARTINGTON man dragged his 18-year-old sister off a bus just hours after she had been granted a forced marriage protection order by magistrates in Manchester.

Fahad Shoshan, 30, of Staffordshire Court, and another brother, had approached their sister in Piccadilly and asked her to come home, claiming their mother was ill. When she refused and got on the bus Shoshan followed and grabbed her around the neck, forcing her onto the pavement. The victim managed to cling onto a post and re-board and passengers then came to her rescue, said Prosecutor Holly Holden.

Read More: http://www.messengernewspapers.co.uk/news/10933471.Partington_man_drags_18_year_old_sister_off_bus_hours_after_she_she_was_granted_a_forced_marriage_protection_order/?ref=var_0

Forced Marriages. They are happening right here in Australia

According to Human Rights Watch, 14 million girls are married, worldwide, each year – with some as young as eight or nine. While early and forced marriage appears most prevalent in countries of Africa, Asia and the Middle East, several recent cases have shown Australia is not immune to the practise.

If the global trend continues, Human Rights Watch estimates that 142 million children will be married by 2020.

Snapshot of Australia

There is no Australian research on the prevalence of forced marriage but the issue was brought to the fore following several recent high-profile family court cases.

A 2010 case involving a 13 year-old Victorian girl began when her school alerted the state’s child protection service that she was not attending school. The school suggested the girl’s absence may be due to her parents preparing her for marriage to a fiance they had chosen for her – a 17 year-old living overseas.

Consequently, the Department of Human Services initiated proceedings in the Family Court that eventually resulted in the court ordering the girl not be removed from Australia before she turned 18. The court also ordered that her passport be surrendered, that her parents be restrained from applying for another passport on her behalf and that her name be placed on the Australian Federal Police watchlist until her 18th birthday.

Read More: http://www.mamamia.com.au/news/forced-marriages-in-australia/

Woman with learning disability was forced to have Pakistani’s baby so he could stay in UK

Mrs Justice Parker at the Court of Protection described the ‘grossly cruel’ ordeal of the woman who has a reading age of seven

A British woman with serious learning difficulties married a Pakistani immigrant and had his baby as part of a plan to help him remain in the UK, a secret court heard.

The 37-year-old woman – who has a reading age of a child of seven – was even slapped around the face by her mother to force her to smile for the wedding photograph. On the day the couple attended a register office to give notice to marry, an anonymous caller rang the office to allege that her parents had been paid £20,000 to marry off their daughter to the Muslim student.

Incredibly, although registrars were concerned about the ‘demeanour and vulnerability’ of the bride and feared she was being ‘manipulated’ as part of a visa scam, the civil marriage went ahead two months later. By then, the woman was pregnant and she went on give birth to a boy. Her 33-year-old husband, from Lahore, is now using his human right to a family life to try to stay in the UK, and lawyers expect him to be granted indefinite leave to remain.

The case was heard earlier this year by the Court of Protection, which has the power to make life-or-death decisions on behalf of people deemed to lack mental capacity.

It emerged with the publication of an ‘anonymised’ judgment. In her ruling, Mrs Justice Parker said: ‘I think there is a very significant possibility that this marriage was entered into, and indeed this child created, for reasons solely to do with immigration status. ‘To inflict pregnancy and childbearing on a person who cannot consent to that state is about as gross a physical interference as can be imagined.

Read More: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2528192/Woman-learning-disability-forced-Pakistanis-baby-stay-UK.html

Nigeria: Women protest against forced marriage to deities

Women in southern Nigeria have been protesting against alleged ritual killings and “forced marriages” to traditional deities, it’s reported.

Such activities are believed to have cost 11 local women their lives in just two weeks, the Nigerian daily Punch reports. About 100 women rallied outside Enugu State government offices on 10 December, demanding an end to “the killing of women through fetish activities of chief priests and deities”. Wearing black dresses and holding palm leaves, the protesters also demanded a ban on “forced marriages” to traditional gods as this violates several articles of the Nigerian constitution. Among the reported incidents is the chief priest of the deity Iyakpala Ugbaike allegedly forcing the daughter of a deceased man to marry him after claiming the same deity killed her father, Punch says.

Read More: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-news-from-elsewhere-25406749

Cultural fears hinder war on ‘honour’ killing, says film-maker

Political correctness is hampering the fight against so-called honour-based violence in Britain, a campaigner has warned.

Deeyah Khan, whose documentary about the victim of an “honour” killing from London recently won an Emmy, called for the police to set up a specialist unit to deal with the problem.

The UK-based film-maker, whose parents are from Pakistan and Afghanistan, said there were police departments dealing with witchcraft and gang violence, but none dedicated to investigating “honour” violence.

Speaking at an international conference on women’s rights in London, Ms Khan compared it with organised crime. She said it needed specialist policing because there were multiple perpetrators.

“The victims have to be protected in a certain way. They are at risk from their entire communities,” she said. “There are aunties and cab drivers and even people in dole offices looking out for the women. There are bounty hunters and hitmen who don’t even take money to kill them, they do it because they see it as a necessity.”

Ms Khan’s film Banaz: A Love Story documented the case of Banaz Mahmod, an Iraqi Kurd from Mitcham who was murdered by her family in 2006, and her body buried in a suitcase in Handsworth, Birmingham. The film won an Emmy for best international documentary in October. She said: “It is awful that these crimes happen anywhere, but the fact it is happening here in the UK is unacceptable.” She added that people were afraid to get involved because of political correctness and a sense that “we don’t want to step on the toes of communities”.

She said: “But if the outcome is our young people die or suffer,  what good is that kind of politeness? Our silence allows this to happen.”

Read More: http://www.standard.co.uk/news/crime/cultural-fears-hinder-war-on-honour-killing-says-filmmaker-8988229.html

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