10yo calls for marriage help
CHILDREN as young as 10 are contacting counselling services such as Kids Helpline confused about why they have to marry men up to six times their age.
Many young women are reaching out to out-of-home care providers to try to escape the horror of being sent overseas to marry a man they have not met, or even their own relatives.
Some are being housed in maximum security “witness protectionstyle” accommodation due to the fear of being tracked down by their family.
Kids Helpline says it is shocked by the increase in forced child marriage contacts recently and believe the rise of radical Islam is playing a part.
In one case, a 10-year-old contacted the service twice in the past two months to discuss her pending marriage to a 31-year-old. The girl spoke to counsellors in March and April via online chat after being told by her parents she would travel to the Middle East to marry a man three times her age.
The girl was scared about the pros- pect of sex with her future stranger husband and was concerned over how to tell her friends and school that she would soon be a child bride.
“She contacted us first in March saying, ‘I want to talk to a counsellor today about getting married’,” said Louise Davis, from Kids Helpline.
“She did talk a little bit about having sex and her concern around what that was all about.”
In April last year, an 11-year-old Sydney girl contacted Kids Helpline for advice on her pending nuptials.
She had been told by her parents she would be sent to the Middle East in the Easter school holidays of 2016 to marry a 56-year-old.
Her 14-year-old sister had been sent to marry a 60-year-old and had given birth to his child.
The Australian Federal Police had been called to investigate both cases. The 10-year-old is yet to be found. Ms Davis said the rise of IS and radical Islam could be in part to blame.
“The numbers we are seeing calling are small but certainly they are more than what we were seeing a couple of years ago,” she said.