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| Nada al-Ahdal, 11 |
In Yemen, the custom of early marriage just met a vocal challenger.
Going viral last week was a video of 11-year-old Nada al-Ahdal ranting about her parents’ decision to forcibly marry her off to a much older man. “What have the children done wrong? Why do you marry them off like that?” she asks the camera rhetorically. Her powerful, candid words touch a delicate nerve amongst Yemenis, some of whom still continue this custom. Just how many? According to a 2006 joint report by the Ministry of Public Health and Population, the Pan-Arab Project for Family Health and UNICEF, early marriage is widely practiced: 52% of Yemeni women and girls are married by the time they turn 18.
