July 28, 2007. Herat, Afghanistan. Shamim is 17 years old and was forced to marry a man of 60 years. She doused herself with cooking oil and lit a match to end her misery...Herat Regional Hospital recently opened a special ward for self-immolation victims, and receives an average of 6 cases per week. Most of them are between the ages of 13 and 22 and the majority do not survive. Many young Afghan girls are forced to marry men who are much older than them. Often they suffer physical, sexual...
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July 28, 2007. Herat, Afghanistan. Shamim is 17 years old and was forced to marry a man of 60 years. She doused herself with cooking oil and lit a match to end her misery...Herat Regional Hospital recently opened a special ward for self-immolation victims, and receives an average of 6 cases per week. Most of them are between the ages of 13 and 22 and the majority do not survive. Many young Afghan girls are forced to marry men who are much older than them. Often they suffer physical, sexual and psychological abuses at the hands of their husbands and/or his family. These young women are also sometimes forced into prostitution by their husbands but rarely admit this publicly because it is too shameful in Afghan society. Setting themselves on fire is a common form of protest or suicide, but there are virtually no social services in place to help these young women out of their situations and accord them their proper rights. Most of them are forced to go back to their unwanted husbands and it is unclear what their fate is thereafter.
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