Islamic Sharia councils are discouraging women from going to the police in cases of domestic violence, a barrister has told the BBC.Charlotte Proudman said that women are being left in “very vulnerable situations where they’re open to further abuse and domestic violence”.The barrister’s comments came in a BBC East Midlands programme which also heard from a Muslim woman who said a Sharia council took the side of her violent husband.
Discrimination
The House of Lords debated a Bill which seeks to restrain the operation of Sharia councils in England and Wales last month.
Tabled by Baroness Cox – a Patron of The Christian Institute – the Bill seeks to challenge the suffering caused by “religiously-sanctioned gender discrimination” and the development of a quasi-legal system.
Speaking to the BBC, one unnamed woman said she had been in a violent relationship for over a decade – since she was married at 16.