A 15-year-old girl is midway through her GCSEs when she is taken out of school. Little do her classmates know, she has been packed off abroad to marry a man she has never met, a man to whom she has been "promised" since birth. They never see her again.
This sounds like the stuff of a bygone era, of faraway places, even fiction. But, in 2011, here in Britain, the forcing of women or girls into marriage is a sad reality for thousands of people.
I have met some of the victims. They speak about wedlock being used as a weapon and the horrors to which this can lead, such as rape, abuse and unwanted pregnancy.
While the prevalence of such practices has come to light in recent years, many myths about forced marriage remain. For example, it is assumed that it is confined to certain religions; but there are Sikh, Muslim, Hindu and Christian victims. Some think forced marriage is a rare practice; but the government estimates up to 8,000 cases a year in the UK. Some assume forced marriage affects only adults; but figures show that more than half are under 16 and some are as young as eight. Some think the victims are solely women; but 14% of complainants are actually men. Some believe it's limited to certain countries; but Brits are being sent to Afghanistan, Egypt, Bangladesh, Iran and Turkey.
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