A court here adjourned the hearing in the divorce case of the two minor girls Shaikha,16, and Abeer, 11, from their husbands,70 and 75, extending their stay at the social care house for the sixth month on the pending case. The hearing has been rescheduled for Jan.3. It was not announced why the court adjourned the hearing. The Human Rights Commission in the Kingdom has earlier urged the court to hand down its verdict in the case. The two girls questioned the delay of their salvation, calling on human rights bodies in the Kingdom to intervene. Hussein Al-Shareef, chairman of the National Human Rights Society (NSHR), said that their mission has ended up at the court doorsteps. Earlier this year, the mothers of the two girls filed a lawsuit for divorce of their daughters on the grounds that the minors were forced into illegal wedlock and were victims of domestic violence. The mothers also appealed to the state to intervene in the case and have their teen daughters divorced. Renowned Saudi scholar Sheikh Abudlmohsin Al-Obaikan has said that the girls should be granted divorce and the two men severely punished. But the marriage contractor has refuted the charge that the girls were illegally married off, saying their marriage contracts were “perfectly legitimate.” In Islam, a marriage is valid only if both the bride herself and her guardian fully accept it. “The two guardians received SR50,000 and SR45,000,” as dowry to exchange each other's daughters, the contractor said. This type of marriage is known as “Shighar” marriage, a practice dating back to pre-Islamic times of marrying off a sister or daughter in return for the hand in marriage of the sister or daughter of the other party. Shaikha had tried to commit suicide by drinking Clorox but she was rescued and transferred from King Faisal Hospital in Taif to the Comprehensive Rehabilitation Center in the same city, where Abeer had been admitted earlier.
