The
controversy over
legalising a minimum age for marriage in Saudi Arabia continued as members
of parliament and human rights activists likened marrying minor girls to the
slave trade, local press have reported.
Activists in the Saudi parliament and the Human Rights Association lashed
out at the idea that minor girls should be permitted to marry following
comments by Saudi’s highest religious authority Sheikh Abdul-Aziz Al-Sheikh
that 10-year-old girls should be permitted to marry.
Sheikh Abdul-Aziz’s
support of child marriage appears to be contingent on each party’s
consent. In statements last year he noted that Islamic law requires both
parties agree to the marriage contract.
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Saudi Arabia is a signatory of the
Convention on the Rights of the Child, which makes 15 years old the minimum
marrying age for girls, said Hussein al-Sharif, head of the National Human
Rights Association (NHRA) Mecca office.
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NHRA
intervened in several child marriage cases throughout the kingdom and
managed to prevent marriages of underage girls with the help of the Emirs
and Sheikhs of those regions, he said.
The association is also
working with authorities on a law to criminalise violence against women and
children. Setting a legal age
for marriage would be part of that law.
