This is just not on and is outrageous, a little girl only 12 years old married off to a 26-year-old. It is more common than we think and it HAS TO STOP NOW. This is criminal, and I do not care if you are a Muslim, Catholic, Buddhist or from Mars. This is AUSTRALIA and it is illegal in this country full stop. Protecting the children is paramount to anything else whether it be religious beliefs or so-called wishes of a child or parent! A bloody child wishing to get married, it’s ridiculous to entertain the thought
UPDATE 13/02/14
Father of 12-year-old child bride charged, but thinks has ‘done nothing wrong’
THE father of the 12-year-old girl at the centre of the Islamic marriage scandal appeared before a court yesterday charged with procuring his young daughter for sex.
The 61-year-old, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, “is of the belief he has done nothing wrong,” Raymond Terrace Local Court was told.
The court also heard the man had a disregard for NSW laws and believed his daughter was “in love” with her 26-year-old “husband”.
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Magistrate Caleb Franklin rejected the man’s bail application yesterday, citing a strong prosecution case and the likelihood of a jail term if he was convicted.
Police charged the father with procuring a child for unlawful sexual activity and being an accessory before the fact to someone having sexual intercourse with a child.
“The defendant has a disregard for the laws of this state,” Mr Franklin said in denying the man bail.
The man’s Legal Aid solicitor said her client, an osteoarthritis sufferer, would find time in custody “very difficult”.
The court heard the man had co-operated with detectives in interviews but disputed much of the police facts including the allegations he facilitated the marriage.
His solicitor said her client claimed his daughter was a “very, very mature strong-willed woman” and he thought the man was about 18-19.
“He said ‘they’re in love and it’s a strong love’ and at this point he’s trying to be supportive of his children,” she said.
Charge sheets tendered in court allege the girl’s father procured her for sexual activity with her future “husband” from when the couple met at a Hunter Valley mosque in November last year until they were allegedly married on January 12.
Outside court, it emerged the girl wrote on a blog site her father told her to wear a hijab to school when she was 11.
“When I was 11 my Dad made the decision I should wear hijab to school,” she wrote.
“To be honest I didn’t want to wear hijab to school. I was afraid of what all the other kids would say or think about me. But when I went to school the next day it wasn’t that bad.”
Charges against the girl’s father followed the alleged wedding of the man’s then 12-year-old daughter in their family living room to a 26-year-old Lebanese man last month.
The girl’s “husband” is in custody charged with 25 counts of having sexual intercourse with a child.
The imam who allegedly performed the ceremony, Riaz Tasawar, 35, was charged with solemnising a marriage without authority and will face court in April.
UPDATE 11/02/14
Police have arrested and charged an imam accused of conducting the marriage of a 12-year-old girl in the Hunter Valley this year.
Detectives from the Child Abuse Squad arrested the 35-year-old Pakistan-born man outside Parramatta police station about 4.30pm on Monday afternoon, police said.
They charged him with solemnisation of a marriage by an unauthorised person.
Police will allege he agreed to conduct a ceremony after he was approached by a 26-year-old man, who was eager to marry the girl.
The 26-year-old, a Lebanese man who is living in Australia on a student visa, has with 25 counts of having sexual intercourse with an underage child.
He is in custody and is expected to make an application for bail before Burwood Local Court on Wednesday.
It had been reported the imam had gone to ground.
“He was located outside the police station,” a police spokesman said.
“It wasn’t arrest by appointment or anything like that, just that we happened to find him outside the police station.”
The spokesman said the imam was not related to the girl.
The imam was released on strict conditional bail and is expected to appear before Parramatta Local Court on April 2.
The girl’s father needs his head read, he talks below, and then further down, how this crime was discovered.
THE Muslim convert father of the 12-year-old girl at the centre of a child sex case following her “marriage” to a 26-year-old foreigner confessed his unhappiness at their union, but said “it was not my decision” WTF ??? IS this father kidding himself? How could he allow this to happen
But the fifth-generation Australian man, who allowed the pair to be married by an imam in his Hunter Valley home on January 12, now says he fears she is going to “die” from a broken heart.
He also addressed public outrage on the case following the 26-year-old Lebanese man’s arrest on Thursday, saying he might “cop a little bit of abuse off people but I will have to cope with that”.
“She was crying like I have never heard before, they were telling her she couldn’t see (the man) today or tomorrow or possibly forever,’’ he said. “She’s being restrained against her will in foster care.
“There’s nothing I can do at the moment, I’ve got the feeling she might die because she’s so hurt by all of this.”
The pair met at a Hunter Valley mosque late last year after the 26-year-old came to Australia to study at a nearby university.
He approached the mosque about marrying the girl but the Newcastle Muslim Association president Bikash “Shahriar” Paul said he was turned away because it was illegal and “wrong”.
He then approached the girl’s father — who converted to Islam about 18 years ago following a battle with drugs, gambling and alcohol abuse — through an intermediary, who told him of the man’s intentions.
He initially refused but agreed to let him come to his house to meet his daughter.
He said it was almost over before it began when she found out he was 26, but she changed her mind.
“She was saying she wanted to get married, I said before there was going to be problems because he was from Lebanon,’’ the father said. “I told him to go back to Lebanon, not nastily.”
The girl’s father said his initial concerns were more religiously guided than the man’s or his daughter’s ages.
However, he said the only way they could be in any type of relationship, let alone in the same room un-chaperoned, under “my interpretation of the Koran” was if they were married.
“My daughter was not going to change her mind, I couldn’t talk her out of it,’’ he said.
“Him being 26 was not a big concern to me because I was not marrying him. I was not happy with it but it was not my decision.”
He said the couple moved to western Sydney after the marriage. He said they tried to enrol his daughter at a local high school but were told to go to Centrelink to ascertain her guardianship.
The father said a social worker at Centrelink raised the alarm before police and the Department of Community Services intervened.
The man was refused bail at Burwood Local Court on Friday after being charged by Child Abuse Squad detectives with 25 counts of sexual intercourse with a child.
Her father, who was interviewed and released without charge, said he knew people would ask how could he let his 12-year-old daughter live with an older man, let alone marry him, but he didn’t “want to stop her happiness”.
The Minister for Family and Community Services, Pru Goward said on Friday she was horrified by the case.
“In this country, little girls have rights and in particular they have the right to a childhood free from this kind of abuse,” she said
Alleged underage marriage uncovered when a 12-year-old child bride and husband, 26, tried to apply for spousal benefits
The Daily Telegraph
February 08, 2014
AN alleged under-age marriage was uncovered this week when a 12-year-old child bride and her 26-year-old husband tried to apply for spousal benefits, according to government sources.
Centrelink sources say the girl was removed from the home she shared with her 26-year-old “husband” hours after enquiring about what support would be available to a spousal visa holder on Wednesday morning.
Concerns also emerged after the man attempted to enrol the girl in a Western Sydney high school.
Newcastle Muslim Association president Bikash “Shahriar” Paul said the accused man was an “occasional” worshipper at a mosque in the Hunter Valley region north of Sydney, where he met the girl.
Mr Paul said he believed the man was originally from Lebanon but had moved to the Hunter Region to study computers at a nearby university about nine months ago.
It’s understood police will allege the marriage took place in a backyard in Sydney’s west on January 11.
After hearing reports about the charges yesterday morning on radio Mr Paul said he called the girl’s father who confirmed “it’s my girl”.
He said the girl’s father “was aware” of the marriage and that police had contacted him on Thursday but did not elaborate further.
The man was arrested by detectives from the Child Abuse Squad and charged with 25 counts of sexual intercourse with a child.
He was denied bail at Burwood court yesterday and will reappear next Wednesday.
Shocked residents in the western Sydney suburb where the couple lived expressed anger about the alleged offences.
One neighbour said before they moved in they had mistakenly gone to the wrong house for an inspection. She said she saw the girl wearing a pink hijab and her partner apologised for the intrusion.
A leading Islamic health services counsellor has warned that hundreds of children as young as eleven are being sent overseas to be married after being “shopped” on Facebook.
Ms Sharobeem, the Director of the Immigrant Women’s Health Services, said children were involved in illegal marriages both in Australia and overseas: “It’s far more prevalent and well-known than people think.”
Minister for Family and Community Services, Pru Goward conceded the problem was more widespread than the case identified yesterday, saying her department had heard of “significant numbers of unlawful, unregistered marriages in NSW, particularly in south-west Sydney, western Sydney and the Blue Mountains.”
“In this country, little girls have rights and in particular they have the right to a childhood free from this kind of abuse,” she said.
The legal marrying age in Australia is 18 unless a court has approved a marriage where one party is aged between 16 and 18.
Aussie Criminals and Crooks 