Presidential Commissioner for Children’s Rights Pavel Astakhov has endorsed child marriages. According to Astakhov, Russian regional officials are authorized to establish minimum marriage age locally.
In Russia, “family law states that in exceptional cases that minimum age is established by regional authorities. In Chechnya that age is 17, in Bashkortostan it is 14, in Moscow region it is 16. There are also regions without a minimum established age. In the Caucasus, emancipation and puberty take place earlier, let’s not be prude about this. There are places where women are all wrinkled up by age 27, and by our standards these women look 50. And anyway, the constitution says we can’t interfere in the personal affairs of citizens,” said Commissioner for Children’s Rights Pavel Astakhov.
Astakhov later apologized for the ‘wrinkled up’ remark, but stood by the rest of his statements.
The Commissioner will meet with the head of Chechnya Ramzan Kadyrov. “We will meet and calmly discuss these issues. I know how Ramzan Akhmatovich [Kadyrov] views underage marriage. He is not for it,” he said.
In mid-May, news of a forced marriage of an underage girl to a 57-year-old police chief in Chechnya drew attention from the public. 17-year-old Kheda Goilabiyeva and her family were reportedly against the marriage, but police chief Guchigov, who already has a wife, threatened to take her away by force and set up posts around the village to prevent Goilabiyeva from escaping.
Head of Chechnya Ramzan Kadyrov has said that he personally checked the facts and found no evidence of conflict between the groom and the bride’s family. The wedding, however, has reportedly been called off.