Horrified by the recent murder of Kawthar al-Husayjawi, one of her female relatives describes what happened – and her fears for other women and girls forced into early marriage in Iraq
As an Iraqi, I feel like I need to address some extremely serious inaccuracies in the article:
The Nine year-old marriage thing: This lasted less than a month and was cancelled due to the sheer amount of protest against it. I know, that’s still unbelieavable how it even reached Iraq in the first place. But this case happened far after the law was cancelled and is illegal, the family’s lewd business might have been a reason(?) Although sadly women’s rights are still limited.
The case is even worse than the article interprets it: The man did not hide her in dirt, he literally dumped her in mud in the middle of a garbage place. And the police only arrested him after the evidence was very undeniable (They were allegedly bribed).
The underage marriage and woman’s rights dismissing protest: This was a very small protest and many protestors there got their fair share of violence.
NOTE: I live in Baghdad, other cities might have different laws, but this article mentioned the incident was in Baghdad too, so maybe it was either not very recent, or maybe that lewd law got re-implemented and I just don’t know it yet.
As an Iraqi, I feel like I need to address some extremely serious inaccuracies in the article:
The Nine year-old marriage thing: This lasted less than a month and was cancelled due to the sheer amount of protest against it. I know, that’s still unbelieavable how it even reached Iraq in the first place. But this case happened far after the law was cancelled and is illegal, the family’s lewd business might have been a reason(?) Although sadly women’s rights are still limited.
The case is even worse than the article interprets it: The man did not hide her in dirt, he literally dumped her in mud in the middle of a garbage place. And the police only arrested him after the evidence was very undeniable (They were allegedly bribed).
The underage marriage and woman’s rights dismissing protest: This was a very small protest and many protestors there got their fair share of violence.
NOTE: I live in Baghdad, other cities might have different laws, but this article mentioned the incident was in Baghdad too, so maybe it was either not very recent, or maybe that lewd law got re-implemented and I just don’t know it yet.
thank you for adding context from a local,. one of the great things about this place