By Desire Emmanuel with Agency Reports
The Taliban in Afghanistan have introduced a new family law with no minimum age for marriage, prompting warnings from rights groups that the rules risk normalising child weddings in Afghanistan, the Daily Mail of UK reported on Wednesday.
The Taliban are Sunni Islamic fundamentalist political and militant organisation that rule Afghanistan and advocate a strict, hardline interpretation of Sharia and they are known for enforcing severe social restrictions, including extensive curbs on the rights of women and girls
United Nations Women’s special representative in Afghanistan, Susan Ferguson, said on Wednesday that the new legislation represented ‘another serious development’ in the erosion of women’s rights nearly five years after the group returned to power.
The agency warned that the rules failed to establish a minimum age for marriage and mark a departure from laws in force before the Taliban takeover in August 2021, when Afghanistan criminalised forced child marriage.
“By implying that child marriage is permitted, it risks normalising the practice,” Ferguson said.
According to UN official, the new regulation instead describes procedures through which a marriage involving a child could be annulled after the individual reaches puberty.
The 31-article regulation called ‘Principles of Separation Between Spouses’ outlines rules governing the dissolution of marriages under an endless list of religious and legal conditions.
These include child marriage, breastfeeding relations, forced separation, missing husbands, apostasy and accusations of adultery.
Significant attention is given to the section on ‘khiyar al-bulugh’ (‘option upon puberty’), an Islamic legal provision that allows for the annulment of a marriage contracted during childhood once the person reaches puberty.
According to Article 5, if a child’s marriage is arranged by relatives other than their father or grandfather, it is legally valid provided the spouse is socially compatible and the dowry is appropriate.
The regulation states that the child may later seek annulment after reaching puberty, but only through a court order.
The rules also grant familial patriarchs wide authority over child marriages, but state that marriages may be invalidated if guardians are considered abusive, mentally unfit or morally corrupt.
Several provisions uphold strict guardianship, notably Article 7, which establishes a double standard for marriage consent.
The document states that the silence of a ‘virgin girl’ is interpreted as consent to marriage, whereas the same silence from a male or previously married woman is not.
The regulation also gives Taliban judges broad powers to intervene in marital disputes regarding issues such as apostasy, ‘turning away from Islam’, prolonged absence of a husband and accusations of adultery.
It specifically mentions ‘zihar’, a classical Islamic concept where a husband compares his wife to a forbidden female relative.
Under this section, judges can force husbands to fulfil religious penalties or grant divorce. They may use imprisonment and physical punishment to enforce compliance.
The text also covers marital restrictions under Islamic law regarding ‘milk kinship.’
