A mother has become the first person to be jailed under Australia’s forced marriage laws for compelling her daughter to marry a man who later murdered her.
Sakina Muhammad Jan, in her late 40s, was convicted of coercing her daughter, Ruqia Haidari, into marrying 26-year-old Mohammad Ali Halimi in 2019, for a small payment.
Six weeks after the wedding, Halimi killed Haidari, for which he is now serving a life sentence.
On Monday, Jan, who had pleaded not guilty, was sentenced to at least a year in jail. The judge highlighted the “intolerable pressure” Jan had placed on her daughter.
Australia’s forced marriage laws, introduced in 2013, have a maximum penalty of seven years imprisonment. While several cases are pending, Jan is the first to be sentenced under this law.
Jan, an Afghan Hazara refugee who fled the Taliban and migrated to Victoria with her five children in 2013, continues to maintain her innocence despite her lawyers stating she suffers enduring “grief” over her daughter’s death.
The trial revealed that Haidari was first forced into an unofficial religious marriage at age 15, which ended after two years.
She did not want to marry again until she was 27 or 28, as she wished to pursue education and employment.
Judge Fran Dalziel, in her sentencing remarks, noted that Jan may have believed she was acting in her daughter’s best interests but had repeatedly ignored Haidari’s wishes and “abused” her power as a mother.
“Haidari would have known that not taking part in the marriage would raise questions about you and the rest of the family. She was concerned not only about your anger, but your standing in the community,” Dalziel said.
Jan was sentenced to three years in jail but may be released after 12 months to serve the remainder of her sentence in the community.
According to local media, Jan refused to accept the judge’s ruling before being taken away.
During Halimi’s sentencing for Haidari’s murder in 2021, a court in Western Australia heard that he had been violent and abusive, insisting that Haidari undertake household chores.
Attorney General Mark Dreyfus stated that forced marriage is “the most reported slavery-like offence” in Australia, with 90 cases reported to federal police in 2022-23.
The government is committed to eradicating the practice, which police say is on the rise. In May, Australia’s parliament voted to create an Anti-Slavery Commissioner to address claims of exploitation.
Source-BBC
