[violence]early and forced marriages

The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) is supporting a new anti-child marriage movement in the eastern Indian state of West Bengal, where nearly half of all girls become child brides and one-third become teenage mothers even though the legal marriage age is 18. We need to have a zero-tolerance policy towards child marriage, so that every child, boy and girl, has the opportunity to live their childhood and gain an education said Karin Hulshof, UNICEF India Representative.

In 2002, a report titled Refugee Women at Risk called attention to several acute challenges facing women seeking asylum in the United States. Published by the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights (now Human Rights First), Refugee Women at Risk illustrated how restrictive provisions in a 1996 immigration law, the "Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act", undermined the United States‘ commitment to offer protection to those fleeing persecution. Refugee Women at Risk highlighted how barriers that the 1996 law created for all asylum seekers interposed particularly significant and even insurmountable obstacles to women fleeing violence and oppression, principally through policies of expedited removal, detention of asylum seekers, and the one-year filing deadline for asylum claims.

It was every little girl’s dream - she was to get a new dress, jewellery, sweets and a party for all her friends. What 10-year-old Aisha* did not know was that after the wedding party she would have to leave school, move to a village far from her parents’ home, cook and clean all day, and have sex with her older husband. “He took out a special sheet and laid me down on it,” Aisha told IRIN, wringing her small plump hands. “After it, I started bleeding. It was so painful that I was crying and shouting, and since then I have seen him as death.”

The forms of violence referred to as “harmful cultural or traditional practices” have been addressed by the United Nations for many years. These forms of violence include female genital mutilation, female infanticide and prenatal sex selection, child marriage, forced marriage, dowry-related violence, acid attacks, so-called “honour” crimes, and maltreatment of widows.