UN, Women’s Rights Groups Put Pressure Zimbabwe to Prosecute Man Who Married 14-Year-Old Girl
Voice of America
HARARE - Women’s rights activists, opposition groups and the United Nations are pressuring Zimbabwean authorities to arrest a man who had married a 14-year-old who died last week while giving birth at a church shrine. Zimbabwean police say they are investigating the matter. Hashtags #EndChildMarriagesNow and #justiceforMemory have been trending on social media after 14-year-old Memory Machaya died while giving birth at an apostolic sect shrine about 400 kilometers east of Harare. The United Nations in Zimbabwe issued a statement saying child marriages continue to surface in Zimbabwe, where one out of three girls is married before the age of 18. Sirak Gebrehiwot, the U.N. spokesman in Zimbabwe said that is not acceptable.
"The United Nations in Zimbabwe notes with deep concern and condemns strongly the surrounding circumstances leading to the untimely death of 14-year-old Memory Machaya from Marange, who died while giving birth at an apostolic sect shrine," he said. One of the key instruments to ending child marriages in Zimbabwe, the U.N. believes, is to fast-track the adoption of the Marriage Bill that recognizes child marriage as crime and, of course, rolling out national action plan on ending child marriages will go a long way.” Responding to the social media protests, Zimbabwean police issued a statement saying they are “conducting investigations” into Machaya’s death.A TV screen shows a file image of North Korea's rocket launch during a news program at a bus terminal in Seoul, South Korea, May 27, 2024. FILE - Japanese Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi speaks to reporters in Colombo, July 29, 2023. FILE - A TV screen shows a report of North Korea's spy satellite into orbit with its third launch attempt this year with an image of North Korea's leader Kim Jong Un during a news program at the Seoul Railway Station in Seoul, South Korea, Nov. 22, 2023.
Palestinians gather at the site of an Israeli strike on a camp for internally displaced people in Rafah on May 27, 2024. Fire rages following an Israeli strike on an area designated for displaced Palestinians, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, in this still picture taken from a video, May 26, 2024. Palestinians gather at the site of an Israeli strike on a camp for internally displaced people in Rafah on May 27, 2024. A member of the bomb squad of the Israeli police collects debris after a rocket fired by Palestinian militants struck in the Israeli city of Herzliya on May 26, 2024.