The Associated Press via Yahoo! Alerts / IRIN-News and Plus News

KSA, RIYADH: An 11-year-old boy distributed invitations to his classmates for a big event his family was planning for him in the summer – and it wasn't his birthday party. It was his wedding to a 10-year-old cousin, but the marriage was eventually put on hold after pressure from the governor of the northern province of Hail, who considered the elementary-school student too young to marry – Daniel: that’s funny; no mention of the 10-year old girl. Either she doesn’t know, or she’s not required or allowed to know, that she was too young to marry. She is only a slave, or a toy, or a piece of property.

The case is among a recent spate of marriages involving the very young reported in the media and by Saudi Human-Rights Groups. They have been widely denounced by activists, clerics, and others who say such unions are harmful to the children and trivialize – make a mockery of – the institution of marriage. Daniel: Marriage, as it is, has become an absolute farce and a joke, and is already in a terrible mess!

According to the head of the research department at the Center of University Studies for Girls, Saudi Arabia is already rocked and shocked by a high divorce rate that has jumped from 25% to 60% over the past 20 years; and a board member of the Human Rights Commission, a Saudi government-run rights group, said they were studying the issue in order to put an end to these marriages that violate international agreements the kingdom has signed.

The commission recently succeeded in delaying the consummation of the marriage of a 10-year-old girl after getting reports from medical center in Hail that she and a man in his 60s had shown up for the mandatory pre-nuptial medical tests. He said that the commission wrote to the governor of the province and the head of Islamic courts urging them to stop the marriage, but there are other marriages involving children that have taken place.

One involved a 15-year-old girl whose father, a death-row inmate, married her off to a cellmate who also was sentenced to death. The father's sentence was carried out on 21^st July – he was beheaded. Pictures of the wedding, held in the prison in Taif, appeared in several newspapers. Media reports said that the inmates recited poems and delivered speeches in the presence of prison officials. The bride and the other women held a separate reception outside the jail as is the custom in the KSA and all Islamic countries.

The couple was allowed to spend two nights together in a special prison quarters after the wedding – Daniel: What a pity they did not remove his head from his neck before he could do that to his young daughter. What is it with these people; fornicate and have babies today, and let the devil take care of tomorrow? This is illiteracy and ignorance at its utmost!

There are no laws in Saudi Arabia defining the minimum age for marriage. Though a woman's (or a female child’s) consent is legally required, most officials do not seek it.

For example, one marriage official said that a father could marry off his 1-year-old daughter so long as sex was delayed until she reached puberty – Daniel: He forgot to add: but if the husband has sex with her (long) before puberty, there is no law against it since she is his wife, his slave or property, or his object of pleasure or amusement.

These officials have the legal authority to preside over marriage-contract-ceremonies. They ask the groom and the girl's guardian if they approve of the marriage and then give them the marriage papers to sign – Daniel: They’re known as ma’thoons and they – like bishops and priests – wouldn’t give a damn or care a hoot about what happened afterwards, so long as they get paid; and I believe such abnormal marriages must bring in much more money than normal marriages between a man and a woman.

There are no statistics on marriages involving children that are performed every year, and it is also not clear whether they are on the rise or whether people hear about them more now because of media outlets and easy access to the Internet – Daniel: As it was in the times of the camels and the tents, is now, and ever shall be; so long as the laws – both religious and customary – remain what they are – misunderstood, misinterpreted, and twisted beyond shape or form – and people only talk and bark and fart over and about them, but do nothing. For your information, no civil laws in any country would allow or permit such immoral and sacrilegious marriages that are tantamount to child-molestation, child-abuse, and even rape – and which display illiteracy and ignorance.

YEMEN, SANAA: The National Women's Committee (NWC), a government body, has called for an end to female child-marriages – common in rural areas – by proposing a minimum legal age for marriage. They had reviewed Article 15 of the Personal Status Law, and proposed setting the minimum marriage age at 18. According to a 2007 report issued by the International Centre for Research on Women (ICRW), Yemen ranked 13 out of the 20 worst countries in terms of the prevalence of child-marriages, with 48.4 percent of women under 18 being married – forced into marriage.

According to a 2007 study – unpublished – on early marriage by the Sanaa University Gender Development Research and Study Centre, religious, tribal and community leaders were against the idea of setting a legal minimum marriage age, saying it would contradict Islamic precepts. Lucky for the Prophet Mohammed, he did not live to see…

N.B: In April, this year, an 8-year-old Yemeni girl sought out a judge to file for divorce from a man nearly four times her age. Her lawyer said she was one of thousands of under-aged girls who had been forced into marriages in Yemen.

Countries where girls married – legally and officially – and gave birth before 15:

Sub-Saharan Africa: Niger, Nigeria, Guinea, Mali, Chad, Central African Republic, Ethiopia, Mauritania

South Asia: Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Nepal

Central America: Dominican Republic, Nicaragua

The Middle East: KSA, Yemen, Jordan, Egypt, Syria, Lebanon; you name it – Turkey, Iran, Iraq; you name it again......