The impoverished South Asian nation has one of the highest rates of child marriage in the world
NEW DELHI, Nov 3 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - The Elders, a group of global leaders focusing on humanitarian issues, have called on Bangladesh not to lower the minimum age of marriage for girls to 16 years, saying it would be a step in the wrong direction.
The impoverished South Asian nation has one of the highest rates of child marriage in the world, despite a three-decade-old law which bans marriage for girls under the age of 18.
In an open letter to Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, The Elders, a group set up by anti-apartheid leader Nelson Mandela, said they were concerned to learn that the Bangladeshi cabinet had approved provisions in the Child Marriage Restraint Act to lower the minimum age of marriage.
"Such a change in legislation would be a step in the wrong direction as it would undermine efforts to reduce poverty and improve the welfare of girls and women across Bangladesh," said the letter signed by Kofi Annan, former United Nations Secretary General and chair of The Elders.
"We urge you to maintain the minimum age of marriage for girls at 18 years of age," added the letter published on The Elders' website.
The Elders, who include South African Nobel Laureate Desmond Tutu, former Irish President Mary Robinson and former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, launched their "Girls Not Brides" campaign in 2011 and have brought together over 400 civil society organisations across the world to work together with the goal of ending early marriage.
Bangladesh has the second-highest rate of child marriage in the world, after Niger, says the United Nations children's agency, UNICEF. About 74 percent of Bangladeshi women currently aged 20 to 49 were married or in a union before 18.
Human rights campaigners say child marriage triggers a series of violations that continues throughout a girl's life such as rape, domestic violence and forced pregnancies.
It starts with forced initiation into sex and on-going sexual violence, resulting in early and unplanned pregnancy, which may put her life or that of her child's at risk.
Girls married as children are often denied the chance to go to school and are isolated from society and forced into a lifetime of economic dependence as a wife and mother.
Yet the practice continues largely due to a combination of social acceptance and government inaction, say activists.
"Bangladesh has made impressive progress in improving maternal and child health over the past decade, but this progress will be hindered if the proposal to reduce the age of marriage goes forward," said the letter. (Editing by Ros Russell)
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