Legalizing Rape and Child Sex Trafficking: Iraq Drafts Law To Legalize Marriage To Girls as Young as 9-Years-Old

Iraqi girls living next to Daurra Oil Refinery in Baghdad. (Adapted from Photo by Christiaan Briggs)

By Liesl Bradner
It’s nearly incomprehensible for people living in a modern, civilized society to fathom there are still countries where it’s perfectly acceptable for a 40-year-old man to marry a 10-year-old girl. Yet, it’s happening in India, Ethiopia, Nepal and dozens of developing countries.

Iraq has recently put forth a controversial draft law that would allow men to marry girls as young as 9 years old and force their wives to have sex without consent. Women would also not be able to leave the house without their husband’s permission.

Approved by the Justice Ministry Cabinet in February, the Jaafari Personal Status Law, named after Jaafar al-Sadiq, a Shiite imam, has yet to be approved by Iraq’s parliament. Analysts say it’s unlikely to make it through before the April 30 parliamentary elections.

Iraq’s current law sets the legal age for marriage at 18 and forbids divorce. After the overthrow of Saddam Hussein in 2003, Shiite leaders attempted to annul the existing 1959 personal status law citing decades of oppression suffered under the Baathist Sunni minority.

No minimum martial age is stated in the draft law however it mentions a clause allowing girls to divorce at the age of 9, which is a roundabout way of implying they could conceivably marry even younger.

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