International
Two laws in force in Bolivia since 2014 allowed the marriage of 487 girls and 4,804 adolescents
Two laws in force in Bolivia guarantee that girls and adolescents up to the age of 17 marry males of legal age, which, according to complaints from human rights defenders of the Andean country, exposes them to sexual abuse, abandonment and unwanted pregnancies.
A recent report by the Ombudsman’s Office revealed that since 2014 the Bolivian State registered 487 marriages of girls and 4,804 links of adolescents, all with the consent of the parents of the minors.
These figures alarm Ariel Ramírez, director of the Munasim Kullakita Foundation (‘quiérete sirta’, in the Aymara language), who works on the problem of human trafficking, pimping, child pornography and sexual exploitation.
“We have forced unions, violations that become conciliations with the aggressor and reach marriage, or cases of rape that become marriages by conciliation. Behind these data we do not see the damages that are generated against the girls nor do you see the future problems they are going to suffer,” he told EFE Ramírez.
The legality of these marriages is based on Law 996 ‘Family Code’, which dates from 1988, and Law 603 ‘Code of Families and the Family Process’, promulgated in 2014.
The first rule states that women “before the age of 14 cannot marry,” but then indicates that “the judge can grant age waiver for serious and justified reasons.”
The second says that exceptionally, marriage can be constituted “at the age of 16, provided that there is the written authorization of those who exercise parental authority.”
“These records date back approximately 10 years and the legal regulations at the time allowed those exceptions to carry out those marriages with parental consents,” the national director of the Civic Registry Service (Sereci), David Dávila, confirmed to EFE.
Given the number of marriages registered in 10 years, Dávila said that it is worrying and that although marriages have been reduced in recent years, they still occur.
“Behind these issues of forced unions there is a total detachment from the State. We have had two cases of girls who were sexually exploited by their husbands. One of them took his friends to his house,” said the director of Munasim Kullakita.
According to Ramírez, among the short or long-term consequences is the abandonment of the husband when the adolescent is pregnant or the removal of relatives after getting married, which leaves the minors more vulnerable.
“I had to get together, I had no other choice, my family left me,” said a teenager interviewed by the Ombudsman’s Office, when asked why she got married.
“It was evident that many, when forced to marry, left their family environment to live with their husband’s family, which implies situations of physical, psychological or sexual violence,” the Ombudsman’s Office concluded in its report “Interrupted Dreams.”
“My father forced me” or “they forced me to marry” reflect the null consent that existed in these marriages, “forcing a girl or adolescent to assume roles of wife at a young age and for those who are not physically, psychologically or sexually prepared,” the institution said.
From the Sereci they reported that among the cases they received is that of a 15-year-old teenager who was taken by her parents to a notary’s s Office to marry a 78-year-old neighbor.
“When the civil registrar saw that age difference, he asked the girl if he agreed and she replied no, that her parents took her and then it was known that the reason for the marriage was an economic matter, her parents had debts,” the source who preferred not to identify himself told EFE.
The marriage was not registered because the teenager’s parents were convinced to suspend it.
According to the Sereci registry, in the eastern region of Santa Cruz there is the largest number of marriages of girls and adolescents. It is followed by the central department of Cochabamba and La Paz.
The investigations of the Munasim Kullakita Foundation agree that some parents take their daughters to marry adult boys because they abused them and became pregnant, or for an economic arrangement.
Ramírez emphasized that in the absence of State protection, which translates into the absence of children’s defenders and sexual and reproductive education policies, measures must be taken from all levels of the Government so that this problem comes to light.
International
China shows at the UN its “condemnation” of Israel for the “violation of Iran’s sovereignty”
The Chinese ambassador to the United Nations, Fu Cong, showed the “condemnation” of his country against the “violation of the sovereignty, security and territorial integrity of Iran” after the air attack launched by Israel against multiple targets in that country, the official newspaper Diario del Pueblo reports this Saturday.
That media echoes Fu’s speech to the UN Security Council on Friday, in which he demanded that Israel “immediately stop all its military actions.”
“China (…) opposes the expansion of conflicts, and is deeply concerned about the serious consequences that may arise from Israel’s actions. The intensification of regional tensions does not interest any of the parties involved,” said the Chinese emissary.
Beijing called on Tel Aviv and Tehran to “resolve their disputes through political and diplomatic means, and maintain peace and stability at the regional level jointly.”
In Fu’s view, the Israeli attack will have a “negative impact” on the negotiations on Iran’s nuclear program: “China has always been committed to the peaceful resolution of the Iranian nuclear issue through dialogue and consultations, and opposes the use of force, illegal unilateral sanctions and armed attacks on peaceful nuclear facilities.”
This Friday, China had already expressed its willingness to “play a constructive role” to curb the escalation of tensions and facilitate conciliation, in line with its traditional position of active neutrality in the region’s conflicts.
The Israeli attack, which according to Tehran caused dozens of deaths, including senior military commanders and at least six nuclear scientists, targeted key facilities such as the uranium enrichment plant in Natanz. Numerous civilian casualties were also reported.
Israel justified the offensive by claiming that the Iranian regime is secretly developing a program to manufacture nuclear weapons.
For his part, Iran’s supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, promised a “severe response” and assured that the attack would reveal the “evil nature” of Israel.
UN Secretary-General António Guterres also expressed concern about the bombing, at a time when Iran and the US The United States is holding talks about the Iranian nuclear program.
International
Donald Trump’s government pauses its program of indiscriminate raides against migrants
The government of US President Donald Trump has decided to pause its campaign of discretionary roundings against migrants in certain areas due to its apparent concern about the growing unpopularity of these methods, according to The New York Times newspaper on Friday.
According to an email to which the newspaper has had access and the confirmation of US officials, the Executive has ordered the Immigration and Customs Control Service (ICE) to pause the beatings that affect the agricultural industry and the hospitality industry.
The spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, Tricia McLaughlin, confirmed in a statement that “the president’s instructions” will be obeyed and the portfolio will also continue to “work to get the worst illegal foreign criminals out of the streets of the United States.”
The decision points out that this campaign of discretionary arrests to try to deport large-scale immigrants is harming industries and electoral constituencies whose support Trump wants to retain for next year’s legislative elections.
The new instructions were transmitted to ICE in an email sent last Thursday asking that “all investigations/law enforcement operations be suspended in work centers in the agricultural sector (including aquaculture and meat packing plants), restaurants and hotels.”
These new guidelines come in turn after more than a week of intense protests in Los Angeles against this immigration policy and that Trump himself admitted that the raids seem to be affecting the agricultural sector, which in states like California, where beatings have intensified, depend almost exclusively on immigrant labor.
Since his return to the White House in January, Trump has implemented an aggressive policy of hard hand against immigration and as a sample of his Cabinet officials recently held a meeting with the ICE leadership to order them to carry out 3,000 arrests a day, a mandate that seems to be behind the intensification of the raids.
International
Trump says he knew “everything” about the attack on Iran and assures that the dialogue remains open
US President Donald Trump said on Friday that Washington “known everything” about the Israeli attack on Iran and that the dialogue on Tehran’s nuclear program “is not dead.”
“We knew everything and I tried to avoid Iran all this humiliation and death. I tried hard to avoid it because I would have loved to see an agreement,” Trump said in an interview with Reuters.
The US president insisted on what he wrote today about the attack on social networks, where he said he gave an ultimatum of 60 days to Tehran to reach an agreement.
“We knew practically everything. We knew enough to give Iran 60 days to reach an agreement and today it is already 61 days,” he explained in the interview, in which he said he did not know what the current situation of the Iranian nuclear program is after the attack launched by Israel, which also ended the lives of key military leaders of the Persian country.
Regarding the dialogue between the US and Iran about the nuclear program of the ayatollahs, Trump assured that “he is not dead”, that “an agreement is still possible” and also recalled that on Sunday a sixth round of dialogue is scheduled in Muscat (Oman) that they consider is now in the air.
“We have a meeting with them on Sunday. Now, I’m not sure if that meeting will take place, but we have a meeting with them on Sunday,” he said.
The United States and Iran have held five rounds of talks on the Iranian nuclear program since April, with Washington demanding that Tehran discard its capabilities both to manufacture an atomic bomb and to enrich uranium, something that the ayatollahs considered unacceptable.
Both Israel and Trump himself had warned of possible preventive attacks on the Persian country due to this refusal by Iran.
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