{"id":801745,"date":"2026-05-17T00:44:16","date_gmt":"2026-05-17T00:44:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/801745\/"},"modified":"2026-05-17T00:44:16","modified_gmt":"2026-05-17T00:44:16","slug":"taliban-legalizes-sickening-child-marriages-with-rules-in-afghanistan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/801745\/","title":{"rendered":"Taliban legalizes sickening child marriages with ‘rules’ in Afghanistan"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Taliban<\/a> has formally legitimized child marriages under a twisted new family law decree that sets out rules for marriages involving minors \u2014 treating the girls as sellable property.<\/p>\n

It also establishes specific guidelines governing \u201cvirgin girls,\u201d reported Afghan outlet Amu TV<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Approved by Supreme Leader Hibatullah Akhundzada, the 31-article regulation \u2014 titled \u201cPrinciples of Separation Between Spouses\u201d \u2014 was published in the regime\u2019s official gazette in mid-May.<\/p>\n

In Taliban-controlled Afghanistan, girls can effectively be sold before they are even old enough to walk.<\/p>\n

Afghan students from the Chagcharan girls\u2019 school recite their lessons. Getty Images<\/p>\n

Desperate families, crushed by poverty, routinely strike \u201cmarriage\u201d deals involving infants as young as 20 days old, exchanging their baby daughters for cash to pay debts or simply survive another day.<\/p>\n

The price of a child bride reportedly ranges between $500 and $3,000, according to human rights groups.<\/p>\n

Nearly one-third of Afghan girls are married before the age of 18, according to the charity Girls Not Brides.<\/p>\n

Under the Taliban\u2019s horrifying new rules, a female child legally married to an adult man may later seek an annulment \u201cupon puberty\u201d \u2014 but only if a Taliban court approves it.<\/p>\n

Even worse, the regulations state that the silence of a \u201cvirgin girl\u201d may be interpreted as consent to marriage. <\/p>\n

The decree lays out the rules for dissolving marriages under a maze of religious and legal conditions, including child marriage, missing husbands, forced separation, breastfeeding relations and accusations of adultery.<\/p>\n

This picture, taken on Oct. 14, 2021, shows Asho (right), a little girl betrothed to a 23-year-old man. AFP via Getty Images<\/p>\n

Afghan burka-clad women line up to receive food aid from a local charity during the Islamic holy fasting month of Ramadan in Ghazni on Feb. 24, 2026. AFP via Getty Images<\/p>\n

The regulations give power over child marriages to fathers and grandfathers, claiming the marriages could be overturned if the guardians are considered abusive, mentally unfit or morally corrupt.<\/p>\n

Since seizing power in August 2021<\/a>, the Taliban regime has imposed what many international observers describe as a gender apartheid system against women and girls, report many humanitarian groups, such as Amnesty International.<\/p>\n

The Taliban has reduced Afghan women\u2019s rights to little more than those of a slave. AFP via Getty Images<\/p>\n

The Taliban\u2019s legal code reportedly does not prohibit sexual or psychological violence against women, reports British outlet GB News. Reports also state husbands are permitted to beat their wives, provided it does not leave obvious bodily harm.<\/p>\n

\u201cChild marriage is not marriage in any meaningful sense. A child cannot properly consent, and treating silence as consent is dangerous because it removes a girl\u2019s voice completely,\u201d political commentator Fahima Mahomed told the outlet.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs a Muslim, I would also strongly reject the idea that this reflects Islam as a whole. The Qur\u2019an itself speaks against compulsion and mistreatment of women, so the Taliban\u2019s position should not be presented as \u2018Islamic law\u2019 in a broad sense.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is their political and extremist interpretation, enforced through power and fear.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Taliban has formally legitimized child marriages under a twisted new family law decree that sets out rules…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":801746,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5],"tags":[7574,223582,20020,245,3228,18075,50,31132,34170,103,107],"class_list":["post-801745","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-world","tag-afghanistan","tag-brides","tag-child-abuse","tag-children","tag-law","tag-marriage","tag-news","tag-taliban","tag-womens-rights","tag-world","tag-world-news"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116587152540605874","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/801745","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=801745"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/801745\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/801746"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=801745"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=801745"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=801745"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}