Going To The Chapel and I'm Gonna Get Married

It’s time to criminalise forced marriage

• By Charlotte Rachael Proudman
• Notebook - A selection of Independent views -, Opinion
• Wednesday, 21 December 2011 at 12:00 am

The Independent

The number of forced marriages is rising every year in the UK. The Government’s Forced Marriage Unit alone dealt with 1735 cases in 2010. 70.9% of these involving families of Pakistani, Indian and Bengali background. 86% of victims were female and 35% were under 18. Of course, the Forced Marriage Unit’s figures do not reflect the full scale of the abuse, as many cases go unreported.

Forced marriage is an appalling and indefensible practice which is recognised in the UK as a form of violence against women and men, a serious abuse of human rights and, where a minor is involved, child abuse.  Yet forced marriage is not illegal in the UK.

Concern for victims of forced marriage led to the Forced Marriage (Civil Protection) Act 2007, which provides a specific civil remedy called a Forced Marriage Protection Order (FMPO).  FMPOs play an important role in protecting victims of a threatened or actual forced marriage from their families, although organisations working with victims of forced marriage report that breaches are common.   In May of this year the Home Affairs Select Committee recommended that the government make forcing someone to marry a crime.  In October the Prime Minister announced plans to do just that, and a public consultation on making forced marriage a specific criminal offence launched last week. I fully support the government’s plans.

Prior to practicing as a family law pupil at Coram Chambers, I undertook research into forced marriage at Cambridge University during 2010-2011.  I interviewed women from South Asian communities, several of whom were survivors of forced marriage.  Having repeatedly heard that victims of forced marriage do not want to criminalise perpetrators of forced marriage, often their families, and that making forced marriage a crime will deter victims from coming forward, I was surprised to find that all of the women I spoke to were strongly in favour of criminalisation. In fact they appealed to me to put forward their views and ensure their voices are heard amongst saturated political and media rhetoric, which appears to have falsely portrayed their views.

They argued that if forced marriage had been a criminal offence when they were forced to marry they would have used the law as a bargaining chip to negotiate with their parents.  They believed that a criminal penalty would act as a deterrent, and also argued that legislation would have a symbolic function in sending a message to perpetrators that forced marriage is socially unacceptable. All of the women I spoke to said they wanted recognition of their rights and of the wrong that had been inflicted on them, and demanded that bringing perpetrators to justice and protecting victims should be prioritised over concerns about demonising the communities which practice forced marriage.

Those in opposition to criminalisation have argued that the criminal aspects of forced marriage – for example abduction, assault and rape – are already covered by existing criminal offences.  Yet these offences do not tackle the control, persuasion, pressure, manipulation and threats that many women experience over time, and they do not offer justice to all – or even to many – victims of forced marriage.

One woman I spoke to, Sami*, was taken to Bangladesh at the age of 17 and subjected to emotional and psychological pressure over a number of weeks in order to force her to marry her cousin.  Sami was told that the marriage was a duty to her parents and to God, and was warned that she would be rejected by her family and by the South Asian community if she did not go ahead with the marriage. When this failed her mother pretended to be ill, whilst her father held a knife to his throat. This immense pressure eventually led Sami to capitulate and enter into a forced marriage.

Sami’s forced marriage would not be illegal under the existing criminal law.  Whereas annulment legislation in England and Wales and the Forced Marriage (Civil Protection) Act 2007 recognise psychological, financial and emotional coercion as forced marriage, criminal legislation does not.  This gap can only be remedied by introducing a specific criminal offence of forced marriage which encompasses a range of coercive behaviours.  Other countries have already done this.  For instance, the Norwegian Criminal Code defines forced marriage as involving “recourse to violence, deprivation of liberty, undue pressure or other unlawful behaviour, or through the threat of such behaviour”.

Criminalisation of forced marriage will make it easier to take action against perpetrators, rather than making use of a patchwork of laws that are not specifically designed to tackle forced marriage, and it may also challenge the attitudes of those who perceive coercion – whether emotional, physical, financial or otherwise – to be acceptable.

Alongside a specific criminal offence of forced marriage, more must be done to challenge the practice within communities and to support victims. Increased funding is needed for groups such as the Iranian and Kurdish Women’s Rights Organisation, which works with victims of forced marriage and campaigns for a tougher response by government and by statutory bodies such as schools.

Many women who are victims of forced marriage feel terribly let down by our Government. It’s time for the Government to stop abrogating its responsibility and to safeguard the rights of women by making forced marriage a specific criminal offence.

*not the interviewee’s real name

Charlotte’s book ‘Forced and Arranged Marriage Among South Asian Women in England and Wales: Critically Examining the Social & Legal Ramifications of Criminalisation’ is availlable on Amazon.co.uk

My Big, Fat, Forced Marriage

Inside an arranged marriage

Sameem Ali was forced to wed at the age of 13, 

but later fled the marriage

27 Nov 2011

The Herald Scotland

It was a small outward rebellion symbolising far greater inner opposition: on her wedding day, 18-year-old Sairah refused to wear the bridal red of Asian weddings, or be bedecked in traditional, heavy gold jewellery.

Instead, she wore pistachio green with a thin, delicate chain around her neck. “What are you doing?” her family demanded. But Sairah insisted. For four years, she had resisted this ceremony. But now she was in Pakistan, far from her home in Scotland, about to marry her cousin. This morning, as the mehndi – intricate henna designs – were applied to her hands, she had passed out. “I was so stressed,” she explains. “I knew within myself that I was not going to be his wife because I didn’t love him. He was not my husband in my heart. I went ahead thinking, what am I going to do?” The ceremony itself was like any Asian wedding. She smiles. “Except I kept my gob shut.”

Tomorrow, new legislation will come into force in Scotland to tackle the problem of forced marriages like Sairah’s. Those at risk will be able to take out a Forced Marriage Protection Order to prevent them being pressurised into an unwanted wedding, and there is also provision for annulling forced ceremonies. This brings Scotland into line with other parts of the UK but, crucially, the legislation goes a step further. Until now, there has been resistance to criminalising forced marriage, (though the Prime Minister, David Cameron, has recently called for the matter to be reconsidered), because Asian women, in particular, would be reluctant to use the law against their own families. In Scotland, having an FMPO taken out against you will not in itself be a criminal offence, but breaching it will be, with penalties including fines and up to two years imprisonment for the most serious cases.

“It’s a great compromise,” says Sameem Ali, who was 13 and living in Scotland when she was forced into marriage in Pakistan. Ali, now a Labour counsellor in Manchester, became a mother at 14. “Criminalising forced marriage completely would push it under the carpet and nobody would come forward,” she argues. “In 2005, female genital mutilation was criminalised. Not one case has come to court. The victims have gone underground and awareness on the subject has gone too. I am passionate about not making forced marriage a female genital mutilation scenario.”

Existing legislation is already used for serious criminal offences related to forced marriage, including kidnap, rape, and child abuse. Ali’s own brother was sentenced to four years after police intercepted a group carrying weapons, and a piece of paper with Ali’s address, when she fled her marriage.

The sensitivities around forced marriage are perhaps similar to those that once existed around domestic violence. The police were reluctant to interfere in marital disputes. That was family. A man’s private business with his wife. It took time for society to recognise that being married didn’t give you ownership of your partner. Now, it is recognising that parenthood doesn’t give you ownership of your child. Forced marriage is sometimes considered a religious issue but every major world religion, including Islam, strongly disapproves of the practice.

It is a cultural issue, connected to family traditions and notions of honour. But that, says John Fotheringham, an accredited specialist in child and family law who has been part of the Scottish Government’s consultative process on forced marriage, is irrelevant. “We don’t care if it’s cultural – it’s not on. This is Scotland and Scots law will apply.”

“Honour” is sometimes taken to extremes. Police are investigating whether Glaswegian Saif Rehman and his American wife Uzma Naurin, gunned down in Pakistan this month while attending a wedding, are the victims of honour killing after Uzma refused arranged marriage. Such cases are rare and care is usually taken to distinguish between forced and arranged marriage, where the parties may not know one another but give free consent to marry. But drawing a clear line can be difficult, argues Fotheringham. “The forced marriage where someone says marry this man or you will be killed, is very extreme. People don’t say that often. What they say is, marry this man or your mother will kill herself and your university funding will be cut off.”

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"From The UK With Love" ...The Modern Slave Trade

Taken on holiday and forced to wed a stranger.

As 8,000 British girls a year are forced to wed against their will!

MailOnline

When 13-year-old Sameem Ali was offered a reward for doing household chores — a holiday with her extended family on the other side of the world — she was overjoyed. 

Still a child, Sameem imagined sandcastles and a beach to play on. The reality was very different. When she travelled from her family home in Moss Side, an inner-city suburb of Greater Manchester, she found herself in a small Pakistani village with no electricity and no running water. 

It was then that her mother told her she was there to marry a man twice her age whom she had seen only once at a family get-together in Pakistan. 

Forced union: Thousands of British girls are are made to marry men who could be twice their age and who they may have never met before saying 'I do' (posed by models)

‘At first, I thought she was joking,’ says Sameem, who is now in her late 20s. ‘Then I thought, “I’m only 13, I can’t get married”.’

On the day of the wedding, her future husband’s family arrived in their best clothes. Sameem was pulled out of bed and given a creased red traditional wedding robe to wear. Her mother told her not to make a scene. 

Under Islamic wedding rules, the bride and groom are married in separate rooms or in an area divided by a curtain. So Sameem’s relatives quickly combed her hair and pushed her into a room where the local mosque’s imam was waiting for her. He told her to repeat after him some words in a  foreign language she did not understand.

She says now: ‘Minutes later, my mother walked in and said I was married.’

Sameem was only allowed to return to the UK (with her husband) when she became pregnant with their son. ‘My family and his thought that if I had a British-born baby that would strengthen his case to come to this country,’ she says. 

A few years later, back in Britain and helped by a friend, she ran away from her husband and started a new life in secret with her child. But her family came looking for her to take her home to her husband. 

One day the police knocked on Sameem’s door to say that they had just arrested three people with her address in their pockets and weapons in the boot of their car. 

‘They said that my brother had paid the three men £50 each to kidnap me and my son by any means possible. If the police had not intervened I am sure I would have ended up dead.’

Sameem has since written a book called Belonging about her experiences, and it is only now that forced marriages are finally being discussed openly having been a taboo subject for years. 

'He told me I was his wife and I had to sleep with him. When I tried to refuse and said we needed to get to know each other first, he hit me’

These barbaric unions are on the rise among second and third  generation immigrants from South Asia and the Middle East — used to keep money and property in the family (which is why cousins are compelled to wed) and in some cases as a cynical device to get a UK visa for a relative. 

Those who refuse their family’s wishes have become the victims of horrific ‘honour’ crimes — including murder, violence and sexual assault. Those who run away from the weddings are often ostracised by their relatives for ever. 

Prime Minister David Cameron has condemned forced marriage as ‘little more than slavery’, saying it is a problem we should not shy away from because of cultural concerns. His views are endorsed by Home Secretary Theresa May, who is investigating if those who organise forced marriages should face criminal charges — as in Germany, France, and Norway. Last year, the Government’s Forced Marriage Unit received 1,735 pleas for help from victims. 

While most were female, 14 per cent were male. Hundreds were teenagers aged 15 to 18, but some were as young as nine. The Department for Education  estimates 8,000 British girls (the majority from Muslim and Hindu communities) enter a forced  marriage every year.

Escaped: Sameem Ali ran away from an arranged marriage. Her family would have killed her for it had police not intervened

Under rules introduced four years ago, victims can seek a special protection order to halt the wedding. Those who contravene the civil court order (such as parents) face a fine, six months’ imprisonment or both. 

Stiffer criminal penalties were dropped by Labour in 2004 when ministers claimed they would be ‘resented as an intrusion into minority cultures and religions’. The Muslim Council of Britain complained that it would lead to the stigmatisation of immigrant communities. 

And there the matter rested. But an increase in forced  marriages — and crimes used to enforce them — has led to the demand for tougher laws. 

One campaigner, former Yorkshire MP Ann Cryer, says: ‘Protection is better than cure. . .  we need to be clear we are talking about girls being raped.’

During this investigation, the Mail spoke to charity workers, health visitors, and women’s groups working in immigrant communities. 

Only a few of them were  prepared to be named, fearing repercussions for discussing what is — astonishingly — seen as a  cultural norm and a private  matter within families. Many said that forced marriages lead to myriad problems, including deeply unhappy couples and bigamy (when a man takes an illegal second wife of his own choosing).  

And it isn’t just women who are forced into marriage — hundreds of young British men are also rebelling at being pressured into sexual unions with virtual strangers. 

The stories from victims of both sexes are horrifying. 

This week I spoke to a 29-year-old Iranian girl working and studying in London, whom we will call Soraya. She is afraid to use her real name because she is in hiding from the brutal husband she was forced to marry just a few months ago.

Soraya came to Britain 18 months ago on a student visa — sent by her parents, who live near Tehran. Although she was getting financial help from her father, she earned extra money by working in a hairdressers in north London. And, it was there — one day in May this year — that an Iranian woman approached her and said her 34-year-old brother was looking for a bride.

 'The mother told her daughter that if she did not consummate the marriage, she would "tie her to the bed, blindfold her and strip her", and then watch to make sure her daughter had sex with her new husband'

Soraya told me: ‘She introduced me to her brother and we all went to bars and restaurants three times. I didn’t like him from the moment I saw him. He had a strange manner and behaviour.’

But when Soraya told her mother in Iran about the introduction, her family took it all very seriously. Within weeks the man’s family and her own forced her into marriage. Her father threatened to cut Soraya off without funds if she refused to wed the man, and her mother begged her to go ahead for the sake of the family’s honour.

So in June this year — although she had never met the man alone and had only spoken to him on a handful of occasions — they  married and Soraya moved into a flat with her new husband.

‘He raped me that night,’ she says simply. ‘He told me I was his wife and I had to sleep with him. When I tried to refuse and said we needed to get to know each other first, he hit me.’ 

A few weeks ago, Soraya ran away from her husband, and went straight to the police. Soraya discovered that the man she had married was a schizophrenic who had wild moods, threatened her and wanted to keep her prisoner in the flat.  

She says: ‘His family knew that he was mentally ill and were desperate to find him a wife. He works illegally in Britain and I think they thought that by marrying me it would help him get the papers to stay in this country.’

Her parents, angry that she has left her husband, refuse to speak to her and have cut off her allowance. She has no idea what the future holds and is getting advice from the London-based charity, the Iranian and Kurdish Women’s Rights Organisation, which counsels those forced into such marriages. 

Victims like Soraya may be fortified by a 2009 landmark case in which a Manchester mother was jailed for three years for forcing her daughter to marry her first cousin in Pakistan. 

The mother told her daughter that if she did not consummate the marriage, she would ‘tie her to the bed, blindfold her and strip her’, and then watch to make sure her daughter had sex with her new husband.

Passing sentence, Judge Clement Goldstone QC said ‘the forcing of a child into marriage against his or her wish will not be tolerated’. 

He added: ‘Where a forced marriage leading to consummation is accompanied by threats of violence and is tantamount to cruelty the punishment will be more severe.’

His stand — so close to the  Government’s own now — must surely be welcomed for the sake of thousands of victims of a cruel and outdated practice which has no place in modern Britain.

European Union Now Debating a Ban on Forced Marriages

Many German women forced into marriage

News 24

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Berlin - More than 3 000 women and girls in Germany, most from Muslim families and many of them minors, faced forced marriage in the course of a year, official research released on Wednesday indicated.

The first federal study of its kind found 3 443 recorded cases in 2008 - the most recent year with sufficient data - in which people living in Germany were forced to wed or threatened with a forced marriage.

Most were between the ages of 18 and 21, although nearly a third of them were under the age of 17.

Almost all were female and the children of staunchly religious immigrant families, most frequently from countries including Turkey, Serbia, Kosovo, Montenegro, Iraq and Afghanistan.

"Those who force their own children to marry someone they don't love, or a perfect stranger, against their will are committing a brutal act of violence against them," Family Minister Kristina Schroeder said, presenting the study funded by her ministry.

More than half were beaten or otherwise physically abused to convince them to marry, while more than one in four were threatened with weapons or told they would be killed if they did not go through with the marriage.

Forty-four percent of the people at threat or subjected to forced marriages held German passports.

The study was carried out by a private foundation and a women's rights organisation based on data provided by victims help centres, schools and immigrant associations.

Germany last year passed legislation against forced marriages, making it a criminal act punishable by up to five years in prison and providing means for victims taken abroad to return to Germany.

Previously, the practice had been considered under the law as a particularly severe form of coercion.

- AFP