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Child servitude and forced marriage in Afghanistan
by Scott Gilbreath ~ February 5th, 2009
Poor families in Afghanistan are resorting to selling young children—sons as servants and daughters as wives—to pay off debts or settle tribal feuds.
In Afghanistan, particularly in poor rural communities, child slavery and debt bondage practices are growing, but are often disguised as marriage, labour or family affairs not requiring state intervention.
Extreme poverty, lack of awareness about child rights, weak law enforcement and strong conservative traditions are among the problems which have pushed many minors – boys and girls – into situations of peonage, child rights activists say.
“These practices – the selling of children and servitude – have the very characteristics of modern slavery which have been overlooked by the government and other actors,” said Ajmal Samadi, an analyst of the Afghanistan Rights Monitor (ARM), a local rights watchdog.
Destitute parents sometimes also offer their young daughters as “loan brides” in order to pay off loans, settle family or tribal feuds and achieve other social and economic benefits.
The opium trade, which promises to enrich poor farmers, can end up plunging families deeper into debt. Drug dealers often advance funds against future production. If farmers fail to produce enough opium and cannot repay loans, dealers take young girls as payment.
According to women’s rights activists in Herat, western Afghanistan, 150 cases of child selling were reported in 2008. The director of a women’s right organisation says there is no law against the practice, which is becoming more common.
Also on the rise in Herat: cases of young women who set themselves on fire to escape lives of brutal abuse and domestic violence.
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February 8th, 2009 at 08:37 PM
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February 8th, 2009 at 08:40 PM
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