Iraq has passed a draft law to lower the age of consent from 18 to just 9.
A young veiled girl is looking on while standing next to her mother during a religious festival to commemorate Ashura, in Dolatabad neighborhood in southern Tehran, Iran, on July 16, 2024. (Photo by Morteza Nikoubazl/NurPhoto via Getty Images)
The proposed law is supported by Iraq’s ruling parties and would effectively legalize child marriage.
An Iraqi girl poses in front of a mural painting on the first day of the school year at an elementary school in Baghdad on October 12, 2022. (Photo by AHMAD AL-RUBAYE/AFP via Getty Images)
The coalition of conservative Shia Muslim parties, which hold a majority in parliament, argue that the change is in line with a strict interpretation of Islamic law and will protect young girls from "immoral relationships."
A girl carries her school bag as she walks in the Nahr Bin Omar village, across from the eponymous oil field and facility in Iraq's southern Basra governorate, on December 5, 2021. (Photo by Hussein FALEH / AFP)
The law would also strip women of their basic right to initiate a divorce, gain child custody and inherit property.
Two veiled Iraqi women are standing together on a street side after participating in a religious festival to commemorate Ashura, in Dolatabad neighborhood in southern Tehran, Iran. (Photo by Morteza Nikoubazl/NurPhoto via Getty Images)
In 1959, Iraq became one of the first countries in the Middle East to set 18 as the minimum age of marriage.
Iraqi girl poses for a picture while others play on a trampoline at a mobile amusement park as they celebrate Eid al-Fitr which marks the end of the Muslim holy fasting month of Ramadan, in the old city of Mosul, northern Iraq. (Photo by Ismael Adnan/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)
However, according to the UN, 28 percent of Iraqi girls got married before this age due to a loophole that allowed religious leaders to conduct marriages for girls as young as 15 if the girl’s father consented.
Women demonstrate near the Kadhimiya court in Iraq's capital Baghdad on November 21, 2021, in protest against the legalisation of a marriage contract for a 12-year-old girl. (Photo by AHMAD AL-RUBAYE/AFP via Getty Images)
The opposition in Iraq has strongly criticized the government’s move, calling it a “catastrophe for women”.
Two Iraqi girls watch a carnival ride as families visit the vast Baghdad Island amusement park on the northern outskirts of the capital. (Photo by Scott Peterson/Getty Images)
Women’s rights activists have also condemned the proposal, accusing the government of trying to “legalize child rape” and warning it would “erase women’s rights” completely in the country.
An Iraqi orphan girl waits to receive a present in the Yarmuk neighborhood in western Baghdad, 05 October 2007. (Photo by KHALID MOHAMED / POOL / AFP)
Meanwhile, protests erupted across Iraq, including in Baghdad, where demonstrators held banners with messages that said, “No marriage of minors” and “I am not a slave, I am free.”
Activists demonstrate against female child marriages in Tahrir Square in central Baghdad on July 28, 2024, amid parliamentary discussion over a proposed amendment to the Iraqi Personal Status Law. (Photo by AHMAD AL-RUBAYE / AFP)A young veiled girl is looking on while standing next to her mother during a religious festival to commemorate Ashura, in Dolatabad neighborhood in southern Tehran, Iran, on July 16, 2024. (Photo by Morteza Nikoubazl/NurPhoto via Getty Images)
Isha Jain
