Seyaj Organization for Childhood Protection succeeded in freezing the marriage of two Yemeni children for five years. The parents of the children, Naima Abdullah Al-Shuwaitir, aged 13, and Hafez Mansour Hamid Al-Hasani, aged 10, signed a written commitment not to complete the marriage until the children reach an age that allows them to make their own decision freely.
Seyaj’s Monitoring and Advocacy Center assigned its legal support officer and complaints specialist to follow the case, which ended with the formal commitment. The two children themselves confirmed that they did not wish to marry.
The father of the boy said he had agreed to the contract in order to protect the girl from the fate of her older sisters, who had been married off at a similar age and later suffered serious health, social, psychological, and economic consequences.
Seyaj said this was the second successful intervention in less than two weeks to stop a child marriage in Yemen. The organization again called on the Yemeni presidency, parliament, and government to enact legislation criminalizing the marriage of girls under the age of sixteen at a minimum, while allowing judges limited discretion in older cases where the best interests of the girl are clearly established.
