By Nykoel Dinardo
Impunity Watch Reporter, Middle East
Photo: Nujood Ali and her attorney Shada Nasser, Courtesy of CNN International
SANA’A, Yemen – On September 16, ten-year old Nujood Ali returned to school as a second-grader. Although her actions may not sound unusual, Nujood Ali has become a role model and example for women’s rights activists in the Middle East and her return to school is seen as a major step towards gender equality. Ali has become the focus of international attention because she filed for divorce in April against her 30 year-old husband, Faez Ali Thamer, and won.
In Yemen, Ali was the first child bride granted a permanent divorce by the court. Her father arranged her marriage in February. When asked why he married his daughter at the age of ten, he explained that two of her sisters had been kidnapped and forcibly married. He believed that, by arranging her marriage, he was protecting her from a similar fate.
Less than a month after Nujood Ali was granted a divorce, nine-year old Arwa Abdu Muhammad appeared a hospital in Sana’a. She complained that her husband had been beating and sexually assaulting her for eight months. These two cases have generated a lot of media coverage and brought attention to the risks of child marriage.
Some consider child marriage to be a part of Islamic culture and conservatives often cite the fact that the Prophet Muhammad married his favorite wife when she was nine to support it. Nonetheless, it has been a hot topic among human rights groups. The United Nations Population Fund has a section dedicated to Child Marriage as a Form of Gender-Based Violence. It explains that those married at a young age face high risk of health problems commonly associated with early sexual activity and childbirth.
In Saudi Arabia, the Saudi Human Rights Commission has been pushing for new laws to increase the minimum age for marriage to 17 years. However, in Yemen, despite laws setting the minimum marriage age to 15 – girls are often married younger. In an interview with CNN, Ali said that she hopes that her actions make “people listen and think to not marry girls so young.”
Shada Nasser, a women’s rights advocate in Yemen and Ali’s lawyer, said that since the press coverage of Ali’s divorce she’s been contacted by several child brides. Nasser said that she plans on doing everything she can to help them.
For more information, please see:
Baltimore Sun – Yemen Divorcee Reclaims Childhood – 28 September 2008
CNN International – Helping Child Brides Break Free – 25 September 2008
Jerusalem Post – Ending Child Marriage in Saudi Arabia – 10 September 2008
New York Times – Tiny Voices Defy Child Marriage in Yemen – 29 June 2008
United Nation’s Population Fund – Forms of Gender-Based Violence and Their Consequences
