Underage marriage: Outcry over child bride’s death in Yemen
Authorities yet to take any action against the girl’s family or her husband.
Authorities yet to take any action against the girl’s family or her husband. PHOTO: APP/ FILE
SANAA:
An eight-year-old Yemeni girl died of internal bleeding on her wedding night after marrying a man five times her age, a social activist and two local residents said, in a case that has caused an outcry in the media and revived debate about child brides.
Arwa Othman, head of Yemen House of Folklore and a leading rights campaigner, said the girl, identified only as Rawan, was married to a 40-year-old man late last week in the town of Meedi in Hajjah province in northwestern Yemen.
“On the wedding night and after intercourse, she suffered from bleeding and uterine rupture which caused her death,” Othman told Reuters. "They took her to a clinic but the medics couldn’t save her life.”
Othman said authorities had not taken any action against the girl’s family or her husband.
A local security official in the provincial town of Haradh denied any such incident had taken place. He did not want to be identified because he was not authorised to speak to the press.
Published in The Express Tribune, September 11th, 2013.
An eight-year-old Yemeni girl died of internal bleeding on her wedding night after marrying a man five times her age, a social activist and two local residents said, in a case that has caused an outcry in the media and revived debate about child brides.
Arwa Othman, head of Yemen House of Folklore and a leading rights campaigner, said the girl, identified only as Rawan, was married to a 40-year-old man late last week in the town of Meedi in Hajjah province in northwestern Yemen.
“On the wedding night and after intercourse, she suffered from bleeding and uterine rupture which caused her death,” Othman told Reuters. "They took her to a clinic but the medics couldn’t save her life.”
Othman said authorities had not taken any action against the girl’s family or her husband.
A local security official in the provincial town of Haradh denied any such incident had taken place. He did not want to be identified because he was not authorised to speak to the press.
Published in The Express Tribune, September 11th, 2013.