News[JURIST] The Jordanian Cabinet [official website] on Sunday revoked Article 308 [penal code text, in Arabic], a provision of Jordan’s penal code which opponents said would allow rapists to avoid a jail term in return for marrying their victim for at least three years. Although the statute was amended [BBC report] in 2016 to only apply to women and girls between the ages of 15 to 18 where the interaction was believed to be consensual, women’s right groups intensified [Jordan Times report] their efforts to have the law repealed. According to a report [text, PDF] by Equality Now [official website], an international women’s rights activist group, similar laws still exist in Lebanon, Iraq, the Philippines, Morocco, Egypt, Ethiopia, Bahrain.
Movements to change these laws are being organized all over the world. Equality Now is currently advancing its “Global Rape Epidemic” campaign [official webstie] to bring attention to laws like the one in Jordan and many other laws which limit women’s rights. On Saturday, activists in Lebanon protested against the nation’s rape loophole law by hanging wedding dresses from nooses [BBC report] along the Beruit shore. Lebanese activists are hoping to have the law repealed during the Lebanese parliament’s next session.
