BERLIN – As part of the Integration Summit, Chancellor Merkel and the Ministry of the Interior invited experts to give testimony on forced marriages to the family committee in the Bundestag. Heiner Bielefeldt, director of the German Institute for Human Rights, was one of many who argued that forced marriage is not a typically Islamic…
Brahms, beer and Beethoven are German, but can a Muslim head scarf be German too? Islamic communities throughout this country are beginning to wonder. What it means to be German is an excruciating riddle, not something casually broached in a cafe. But efforts to sharpen national identity through new citizenship tests have caused a furor…
LONDON – The British government has launched a new campaign against forced marriages, a common practice among the Asian community in Britain. The purpose of the campaign is to create awareness against the practice as an abuse of human rights and a form of domestic violence. The campaign, launched by the Home Office and Foreign…
ITALIAN bishops gave warning yesterday against Catholics marrying Muslims, citing cultural differences and fears that children born to mixed marriages would shun Christianity. Cardinal Camillo Ruini, the president of the Italian Bishops Conference, said: In addition to the problems that any couple encounters when forming a family, Catholics and Muslims have to reckon with the…
The government may criminalize forced marriages, hundreds of which take place annually among Muslims. By James Brandon In a drafty railway station cafe in England’s Midlands, Ayesha, a young Muslim girl whose family is from Pakistan, is trying not to cry as she talks about her wedding day. “When I was young I always expected…
