Identifier
Created
Classification
Origin
09RIYADH596
2009-04-21 14:39:00
CONFIDENTIAL
Embassy Riyadh
Cable title:  

SAUDIS PLAN MINIMUM MARRIAGE AGE

Tags:  PGOV PHUM KISL SA 
pdf how-to read a cable
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INFO RUCNISL/ISLAMIC COLLECTIVE IMMEDIATE
C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 RIYADH 000596 

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 04/21/2019
TAGS: PGOV PHUM KISL SA
SUBJECT: SAUDIS PLAN MINIMUM MARRIAGE AGE

Classified By: Charge d'Affaires a.i. David Rundell,
Reasons 1.5 (b) & (d).

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 RIYADH 000596

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 04/21/2019
TAGS: PGOV PHUM KISL SA
SUBJECT: SAUDIS PLAN MINIMUM MARRIAGE AGE

Classified By: Charge d'Affaires a.i. David Rundell,
Reasons 1.5 (b) & (d).


1. KEY POINTS:

-- (U) The new Saudi Justice Minister has announced that a
"system to regulate child marriages" is under consideration.
The Justice Ministry has constituted a committee of scholars
to provide advice to the King on a minimum age that would be
"best for society."

-- (C) According to Saudi Ambassador to the US Adel Jubayr,
the committee is expected to propose age 17 as the minimum
age at which a young woman is competent to provide the
consent to marriage required by Islamic Sharia. Justice
Ministry sources say the minimum age will be 15.

-- (C) The publicity and attendant local outcry over child
marriage cases has helped build public support needed for the
government to take on religious hardliners over this issue,
sensitive because Sharia doesn't specify a minimum age for
marriage, and the Prophet himself had a child-bride, in the
belief of many.

-- (U) Saudi Arabia is a party to the UN Convention on the
Rights of the Child.

COMMENT & RECOMMENDATION:


2. (C) The Saudi government appears to be pursing a
systematic strategy to neutralize opposition from religious
hardliners to take action on child marriages, which most
Saudis oppose but which are not explicitly banned under
Sharia. This has included allowing publicity regarding
certain egregious cases, to stoke public outrage and build
support for action. As always, however, the King will move
cautiously. The new regulations will include a recommendation
for a minimum age, as well new and tighter guidelines for
marriage officials.


3. (C) The Embassy has raised this issue in our discussions
of human rights issues with Saudi authorities, who point to
the many efforts under way to end the practice. Embassy
recommends that the USG support ongoing Saudi government
efforts to end the practice, and also offer assistance, such
as judicial training and exchanges, particularly with other
Muslim countries who have found solutions based in Sharia, to
promote more consistent protection of children's rights in
Saudi courts. End comment and recommendation.



4. (C) STATUS QUO: Sharia (Islamic Law) does not specify a

minimum age for marriage, and under the Saudi Sharia system,
rulings on family law matters are within the ambit of
individual judges. Their verdicts may be appealed, but given
that Sharia is not based on precedent, Saudi judges have wide
discretion when dealing with cases of child marriage. This
explains why courts have upheld some of these marriages and
annulled others.


5. (C) BACKGROUND: Child marriage is an ancient cultural
practice on the Arabian peninsula that probably predates
Islam. The marriages --which are not/not common-- generally
occur among poor and less educated Saudi families, often for
financial reasons. Fathers marry off their daughters to pay
debts, or enter into "swap marriage" arrangements where each
marries the other's young daughter. Religious conservatives
justify these marriages by pointing to the Quran, which
implies that once a girl has reached puberty she is ready for
marriage, as well as to the example of the Prophet Muhammad,
whose wife Aisha was believed by many to have been only nine
at the time of their marriage. However, many Saudis counter
such arguments by saying that the Quran also requires a
woman's consent to marriage, and argue that girls not yet in
their teens are not capable of deciding for themselves. Some
scholars dispute that Aisha was only nine when she married.


6. (U) RECENT CASES: As noted in the 2008 Human Rights
report for Saudi Arabia, over the last year the Saudi press
reported a number of cases of child marriage involving young
girls married to young boys or much older men, both by
arranged marriage and without the participants' consent or,
in some cases, even knowledge. Several of these marriages
were challenged in court. In a case that garnered
international attention, a judge in the central Nejd town of
Unayza refused to annul the marriage of an 8-year old girl to
a man in his 50s. The girl's father had arranged the marriage
to a close friend to help settle his debts.


7. (U) CALLS FOR A MINIMUM MARRIAGE AGE: This media spotlight
sparked intense public debate throughout the country over the
issue. Most Saudis view the practice as abhorrent. In the
past few months a growing list of local human rights

RIYADH 00000596 002 OF 002


organizations and religious scholars have called for an end
to child marriages. The quasi-governmental Saudi Human
Rights Commission urged the Ministry of Justice to establish
a minimum age for marriage, highlighting that Saudi Arabia is
a signatory to the 1996 Convention on the Rights of the
Child. In November 2008, the Majlis Al-Shura (Consultative
Council) recommended that the King raise the legal age of
adulthood from 15 to 18. Other religious scholars have also
opined that given that Sharia is not clear on the issue, the
King should exercise his authority to determine a minimum age
that would be "best for society."


8. (U) OFFICIALS WEIGH IN: The conservative daily,
Al-Madina, published a two-part series on the subject April
19 & 20, quoting a string of senior scholars and other
officials expressing their opposition to underage marriage.
Sheikh Abulmohsen Al-Obaikan, an advisor at the Royal Court,
favored banning marriage for girls under 18. He argued that
the King had the right to direct his subjects to the better
of two permissible choices (marriage and marriage over the
age of 18),pointing out that some fathers marry their young
daughters for personal or financial gain. He also called on
marriage officials and judges to respect this age. The
Director General of Marriage Officials emphasized that such
officials are under strict instruction to refuse to conclude
any marriage contracts without the clear consent of both
parties, the implication being that a child is not competent
to consent to marriage.


9. (C) REGULATIONS COMING SOON: On April 18, the newly
appointed Minister of Justice announced that a system to
regulate child marriage would soon be unveiled. He explained
that a committee had been constituted to study the issue with
a mandate to provide advice on a minimum age for marriage and
suggestions to address the problems, such as debts and lack
of knowledge, which produce the marriages in the first place.
The Minister stressed that the regulation would not
contradict Sharia, and that the King, in his capacity of
ruler entrusted with the responsibility to guide his people,
would promulgate the regulation to preserve the interests of
society. In an interview with liberal daily Al-Watan, the
Minister confirmed that there would be clear guidelines on a
minimum age for marriage, though he did not specify what the
age would be. Sources quoted in the article said it would be
15, while Saudi Ambassador to the US Adel Jubayr told the
Charge it would be 17.


10. (U) GOVERNMENT ACTIONS TO DATE: In meantime, as has been
the case in other instances of judicial excess, Saudi
Government bodies have intervened to correct several recent
court cases:


A. In October 2008, a court in Bisha issued a divorce
document to end a marriage between a 14-year-old girl and a
70-year old man.


B. In another case, the Human Rights Commission successfully
gained annulment of a marriage between a 10-year-old girl and
a 60-year-old man.


C. In January 2009, an 11-year-old girl successfully won a
six-month court case in Taif freeing her from a marriage to a
75-ya-old man arranged by her 70-year old father. Her mother
(divorced) was granted custody of the girl.


D. In April 2009, a judge reviewed the case of the 8-year old
girl's marriage cited in para 6, and ordered that she be
divorced.
RUNDELL