Consequences of child marriages, include physical and psychological damages, unwanted social results of unsuccessful marriages, families falling apart, increasing number of divorces, illiteracy and even problems such as drug addiction and prostitution.
Firuzeh Mohajer, writer and a Professor at Tehran University said: “…it is best to hear the opinion of the young girls’ families because they most definitely love their children more than us. One must see that such girls are from what type of families.”
Former Iranian MP Mehrangiz Maruti, described child marriages as a social damage and admitted this phenomenon can actually be described as genocide or massacre of girls resulting from economic and cultural poverty.
In 2002 Iran’s Expediency Council specified the age of permitted marriages as 13 for girls and 15 for boys. This council in its 2002 amendment added the sentence: “Based on the request of the father or the grandfather, and the opinion of the court, girls under the age 13 may also be permitted to marry.” This very sentence paved the path to exploit girls.
Mashhad MP Ghazizadeh Hashemi said: “The statistics published on early marriages (more than 40,000 individuals in 2013) is not a high number. When our girls and boys are physically mature, we must not describe these marriages as haram (banned under sharia)….Sometimes maturity comes before the legal age. In such cases the law is meaningless and paves the path for unconventional relations or the crackdown of instinctual demands.”
(State-run IRNA news agency – August 6, 2014)
