Leading women’s rights charity welcomes new law making forced marriage a criminal offence

Diana Nammi, Executive Director of the Iranian and Kurdish Women’s Rights Organisation is available for interview. On Monday, 16 June 2014, forced marriage becomes a self-standing criminal offence in England and Wales and in Scotland punishable by up to 7 years in prison. At the same time, in England and Wales it also becomes a criminal offence to breach a Forced Marriage Protection Order, in line with Scotland where this is already the case. The Iranian and Kurdish...
Read More

Stand Up for Dunya

Some of the events of the murder of 15-year old Dunya remain unclear. However, the fact that she was killed, and probably by her husband is, certain. We know that the murder was brutal and savage: that her breasts were cut off, her eyes gouged out, that she was dragged behind a vehicle before being pumped with nine bullets from an AK-47. And that prior to her death, her life was a circuit of misery. Before her marriage to her murderer,...
Read More

Diana Nammi on forced marriage

Diana Nammi discussed what research can tell us about how to attack forced marriage with Nick Ferrari on LBC on the 17th January. If you missed the show, you can listen here: [soundcloud url="https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/130946611" params="color=ff5500&auto_play=false&show_artwork=true" width="100%" height="166" iframe="true" /]
Read More

The right to choose

Everyone has THE RIGHT TO CHOOSE not to marry at all or not to marry a particular person. Forced Marriage is a form of violence. It is a serious abuse of human rights. When the victim is a minor it is also child abuse. A Forced Marriage is any marriage to which either party does not freely and genuinely consent. Each party to a marriage must have the capacity to be able to give informed consent. A person’s age, mental and physical health...
Read More

Another chance to see ‘Banaz: A love story’

[caption id="attachment_1378" align="alignleft" width="300"] Banaz Mahmod asking police for help in hitherto unseen footage[/caption] The councils of Hammersmith & Fulham, Westminster and the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea are holding a free screening of Banaz: A love story as part of an event to raise awareness of forced marriage. This will be followed by a panel discussion of the movie, held by the Director Deeyah, which will include Diana Nammi, Director of IKWRO. The film, which premiered...
Read More

Criminalisation of forced marriage by Diana Nammi, Director of IKWRO

A vital step forward in the fight for universal human rights and against cultural relativism I strongly welcome the government’s announcement last week that forced marriage will become a criminal offence in the UK.  It is a historical achievement in the fight for women’s human rights and against cultural relativism and racism. Forced marriage is a violation of human rights and leads to rape, domestic violence, forced child bearing and even ‘honour’ killing. The Universal Declaration of Human...
Read More

Victims of forced marriage now know that what is happening to them is wrong, illegal and can be stopped

Today the Government announced plans to make forcing someone to marry a criminal offence.  My organisation, the Iranian and Kurdish Women’s Rights Organisation, has worked with survivors of forced marriage since 2002 and we have been campaigning for a change in the law for the past six years. Criminalisation is a vital weapon in the fight against forced marriage.  Under the current system, although a girl who is at risk of being or has already been forced into...
Read More

PRESS RELEASE: IKWRO welcomes Government plans to make forced marriage a crime

Criminalisation a vital weapon in fight against forced marriage The Iranian and Kurdish Women’s Rights Organisation welcomes the Government’s announcement today that it plans to make forcing someone to marry a criminal offence.  IKWRO has been campaigning for the criminalisation of forced marriage since 2006. “Perpetrators of forced marriage will now be held accountable for their actions and could be sent to prison,” said IKWRO’s Director Diana Nammi. “The UK is sending an unequivocal message to parents who...
Read More

Criminalisation of forced marriage – IKWRO statement of support

Forcing someone to marry is a serious violation of human rights which deprives the victim of the ability to make fundamental decisions about their life.  It can also involve serious crimes, including rape, abduction, assault and imprisonment.  Yet forced marriage is not a crime under UK law. Last May the Home Affairs Committee recommended that the government make forcing someone to marry a criminal offence.  The HAC argued that this “would send out a very clear and positive...
Read More

Nearly 3000 cases of ‘honour’ violence every year in the UK

[caption id="attachment_1608" align="alignleft" width="300"] Thousands of women report 'honour' crimes in the UK[/caption] New research by IKWRO has found that more than 2800 incidents of 'honour' based violence were reported to police across the UK last year. IKWRO sent Freedom of Information requests to all 52 police forces across England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland asking how many incidents of 'honour' based violence they had recorded last year.  39 police forces responded with a total of 2823 incidents....
Read More

If you are worried about someone knowing you have visited this website please read this safety information.

There is an escape button at the bottom right corner of the page opposite this box. Please test it so you know how it works.