Amine … is 16 years old. She was forced to marry at the age of 14 but has many problems with her husband and his family. She doused herself with oil and set herself on fire to protest her unwanted marriage but her father says that she must return to her husband because there is no such thing as divorce in their family. She has burns over 33% of her body. She has vowed to kill herself if forced to go back.
So reports WIB-pal Anne Holmes, aka Vigilante Journalist, from Herat, Afghanistan:
Many young Afghan girls are forced to marry men who are much older than them. Often they suffer physical, sexual and psychological abuses at the hands of their husbands and/or his family. These young women are also often forced into prostitution by their husbands but rarely admit this publicly because it is too shameful in Afghan society. Setting themselves on fire is a common form of protest or suicide, but there are virtually no social services in place to help these young women out of their situations and accord them their proper rights. Most of them are forced to go back to their unwanted husbands and it is unclear what their fate is thereafter.
It’s not just an Afghan problem. Self-immolation is all too common in many Islamic cultures. I reported on the tragic phenomenon from Iraqi Kurdistan last year for The Village Voice:
“Here in Kurdistan, there is a lot of violence against Kurdish women,” [radio host Sirwa] Ali says in delicate English. She’s an Iranian Kurd by birth, a swimmer by training, and superbly educated by Iraqi standards, lending a quiet confidence to her words. Asked who is perpetrating this violence, she doesn’t hesitate: “Men, of course. Husbands, brothers, fathers, managers. All men.”
Abuse drives many Kurdish women to suicide, says Ali. “Here in Kurdistan, most women, when they want to kill themselves, they burn themselves. I don’t know why.”
Regional assemblywoman Vian Dizyee does. She says that in a society where women have few resources at their disposal, sophisticated methods of suicide are impossible. So women self-immolate using household items like cooking fuel and matches.
Meet Ali in my C-SPAN vignette:
[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/bBYOZCiEKBk" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]
[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/b_0xa15XCRQ" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]
Related:
Afghan gays out big time
U.S. journo murdered for loving an Iraqi?
(Comic art above is from my forthcoming graphic novel LOVE & TERROR)
Related posts:
- U.N. Dispatch: War Not Cause of Self-Immolation Suicides in Afghanistan
- U.N. Dispatch: The Bloody Hands of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, Part Two
- Unastan: The Roads of Kabul
- Axeghanistan ’10: Pretty Boy
- Afghanistan War Lacking Afghans
- Voice of America: Implementing “Smart Power” in Afghanistan Poses Challenge for U.S.
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i hate that they r so mean u iraq ppl r so gay>_
i know that all this evil stuff is happening in Afghanistan and some other countries, but u have no right to blam the religioun Islam for it. There are Hindus, who force there daughter to marry someone realy old, the Christian Australian dude raped his “own daughter”. all i want to say is that please stop blaming any religioun only because some moron did something evil. now u can not just call every Christian, Muslim, or Hindo a bad person, because of one person doing something wrong.
good on you Umai!!!
i belive so,
but i believe in education too,
girls have right to get education and they can choose their husbands( these are their basic rights) curse on you people who dont let them to do so,
and laziness is HARAM( is a very big sin)
let you know muslim world!!!!
by the way there is no kurdistan on the world map,
we all know what you are doing in Turkey
just making trouble nothing else, world remember
you like this!!!
I dont no any Muslims that are lazy. I have met alot of jews that are. So shame on u jews!! Shame on u for ruinin our economy and terrorizing Muslims. All u do is sit on ur ass and play with other peoples money. Get a real job and sweat like the rest of us!!!
The informatiions are shocking, but you see ugly faces are every where on thgis earth in every religion. Islam forbid us from such thing and teaches us that marriage with out the will of both the parties i.e. bride and groom is not even a marriage. So far the shamful acts are concrend, what the nuns and fathers sadhoos and pundits have not done shmful in their temples and chuches like raping of girls and sex scandels. So a religion is not responsible for one’s personal act, moreover for beeter co-ordiantiion of this earh its beter this crusad war as declared by ex-president of USA declared in his speach be stopped from religeous poit of view. let us make this world a happy place for the people from all walks of life and religeon
i just want to say that the suicide bombings in pakistan and in other muslims countries are not done by the muslims extremists but it is done by the non muslims agencies who are enemies of islam and who are in favour of the NEW WORLD ORDER many agents from pakistan have been caught who were brain washing the children and then using them for bombings purposes
If you people want to make afghans by writing this wrong news or some thing it is not possible afghan’s are great. people not like this the one who does like is not afghan and can not be called afghan he is not human who do like this? but getting marry to old aged man is not bad then that To have sex on street’s or in bars or hotel but forcing her beating is bad i do accept that.
AOA
dear it is not good to that we will comments on Islam because,immolation is not the part of our culture and Islam.secondly most of the other religion believe on those act of happenins.
culture is the main reason behind this problem( burn themselves in the muslim sosiety
I think what they have mentioned about afghanistan is so not true. i am an afghan girl myself i was grown up in afghanistan and we are nothing like that. it might have been like that in olden days but it has changed so much since then. Now the girls have the right to choose the guy they marry.
Just because all this happend to this girl does not mean it happens to all. I dont think islam should get the blame for it coz hello guys ISLAM IS THE BEST so urs better stop talking shit about islam and my beautiful afghanistan or else….. trust me you dont wana know LOL
if the woman wants to marry the older man then she should be allowed but if she does not want to marry the old man then she should not be forced too. isnt it against islam to force someone to do something against their own will? And if the woman doesnt want the old man then how will their marriage be a good one? it can cause all sorts of complications. And lastly it has to be taken into account that the old man doesnt just want to marry the youg girl because he is a pervert and wants to have sex with young girl…this is a very wrong reason to get married and im sorry but there are a lot of old men who are perverts and please allah forbid that these poor young girls are being subjected to the disgusting fantasies of these old men. there are so many things to consider but sometimes the family doesnt consider their daughters feelings or because the mother was forced into a marriage she didnt want, so they force the daughter to marry out of spite. what ever happened to a womans choice in these islamic countries? i know that this is not the case for all people in islam, some are very happy and liberated but its the isolated towns where the women and men have no education and the people are ignorant that they still believe its okay to send a wife back to her husband who is beating her, even if it kills her. where is the womans rights then? where is the social services where the woman can go for help? there are none or very few. this is something that asia and middle east still need to work on. Where can the women go for help without risk of being killed for shame? whos shame is it? the womans or the husband who has beaten her? its ridiculous honestly, if it works in australia, then why cant it work in any other country? its a matter of the men wanting women to have rights. islam is beautiful but the corruption in islamic goverments is horror. and lastly, what i really dont like is when you ask a muslim about the corruption in the countries that immediately try ot point out a fault in another religion or culture. they try to shift the topic from their culture to someone elses. if i ask you about why are women forced into marrying an old man then Umai H above quickly points out “There are Hindus, who force there daughter to marry someone realy old, the Christian Australian dude raped his “own daughter”.
Well Umai H we didnt ask you about the christians or the hindus we asked about the muslims. So instead of shifting the topic to something or someone else why dont you talk about the ‘actual’ topic being discussed. i would like to add that i am a western girl who converted to islam and i love allah and islam but it angers me so much that the women are treated like dogs. the woman must cover her face and not leave the house so the men cant see her. well its true…the men should practice ‘some’ kind of self control. the women should not give up all her human rights because the men dont want to be tempted. its called self control guys. practice it!
yeah , this is not afghan it is all Pakistan and Iran Work i cnt belive that they would be Muslim they dnt let afghanistan to grow and see what they are doing ,,, shame for them one day we well do it like this !