Makhachkala (Dominik K. Cagara /OC Media)
A 35-year-old woman from Makhachkala tells Daptar that becoming a second wife is a dream come true. [Read more…]
Voice | ‘I’m a second wife and I don’t care what you think’
Girl abducted for marriage returned home in southern Georgia
(bolnisi.ge)
A 20-year-old girl abducted for marriage has been returned to her parents’ house. [Read more…]
Divorce in Azerbaijan: women’s empowerment or stigma?
The Statue of a Liberated Woman in Baku (Runle031 /Pinterest)
Increased rates of divorce have become a topic of a public debate in Azerbaijan. Many see the reason in a changing place of women in society.
Life on the margins: Lesbian families in Azerbaijan
(OC Media)
The mere existence of lesbian couples in Azerbaijan is rarely talked about or acknowledged. Out of sight of the public and even queer rights activists, some women still live together and raise children as families.
[Voice from Daghestan] ‘I can’t get divorced. I suffer for my children and my parents’
One resident of Daghestan told Daptar about the importance of trust between parents and children and the need for sex education for teenagers.
[Voice from Chechnya] Twenty years with a kidnapper
(kristof-blog.ru)
‘My family was destroyed together with what used to be Chechnya. My husband and I argued endlessly’. Love, abduction, war, and divorce — a Chechen woman told her story to Daptar.
Chechnya’s ‘family reunion commission’
'How in Chechnya, authorities force divorced spouses to come back together'
(Daptar)
At the end of July, Chechen authorities reported on the progress of the Commission on the Reunification of Broken Families. They said that ‘in a short time’ they had managed to reunite 240 divorced couples. However, some experts say that such a commission could only work with the help of professional psychologists and NGOs, to get to the real root of family conflicts. [Read more…]
Georgia’s parliamentary speaker says marriage definition to ‘reduce homophobia’
Irakli Kobakhidze (parliament.ge)
Georgia’s parliamentary speaker has claimed that a recent initiative to define marriage as a union between a woman and a man ‘will reduce homophobia’. Georgia’s current constitution reads that ‘marriage shall be based upon equality of rights and free will of spouses’, without specifying the gender of the spouses.
Kadyrov speaks against civil registration of marriages; for polygamy
Ramzan Kadyrov (rt.com)
On 19 April, Chechen Head Ramzan Kadyrov told Russian state news channel Russia Today that civil registration of marriages ‘destroyed families’ and was evidence of mistrust between spouses.
Georgian rights groups back civil partnerships for same-sex couples
Queer activists rally in front of Tbilisi City Court. 2016 (Mari Nikuradze/ OC Media)
Several prominent civil society organisations in Georgia have come out in support of civil partnerships for same-sex couples, while the government is attempting to amend the constitution to explicitly define marriage as a union between a woman and a man. [Read more…]
