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Government must make registration of sharia marriages mandatory, report says

Many Muslim women are unaware that they lack legal protection and access to marital rights after they have got married in an unregistered ceremony
Many Muslim women are unaware that they lack legal protection and access to marital rights after they have got married in an unregistered ceremony

The Government must overcome the fear of being labelled "Islamophobic" and make the registration of sharia Muslim marriages mandatory, according to a new report.

Around 100,000 sharia marriages take place in the UK every year, of which up to 75 per cent are thought to be unregistered.

Many Muslim women are unaware that they lack legal protection and access to marital rights after they have got married in an unregistered ceremony.

For women in such unregistered religious-only marriages, divorce has no legal status in UK civil or family law, leaving them facing destitution without financial assets or property as well as being shunned by their community.

FAQ | Sharia and the UK law
FAQ | Sharia and the UK law

The report by the Civitas think tank, called "Fallen Through the Cracks", cites a number of case studies featuring Muslim women in "marital captivity" and forced to hand over custody of their children in return for a divorce.

Author Emma Webb accuses successive governments of failing to address "this well-known problem", claiming reluctance to act "may be the result of a fear of being accused of Islamophobia".

"Despite calls from Muslim women activists and the international bodies, everyday women continue to suffer horribly because of completely unjustifiable shortcomings in our legislation," she said.

"Despite bigamy being illegal in the UK, the fact that religious-only marriages can go under the radar effectively allows men to enter into polygamous relationships that leave the women with absolutely no marital rights or legal protection under UK law.

"This leaves women and their children vulnerable to abuse, exploitation and destitution – it simply cannot be allowed to continue."

The report recommends that the current legislation be amended to make the registration of all religious marriages in England and Wales mandatory, in line with the proposals of the Marriage Act 1949 (Amendment) Bill.

It also calls for the Divorce (Religious Marriages) Act 2002 to be extended to cover Islamic divorces, as was previously achieved for the Jewish community, and suggests an education campaign be launched to make people more aware of the consequences of unregistered religious-only marriages.

Peers Baroness Cox and Lord Carlile both endorsed the report, published on Tuesday.