On July 11, a regional seminar on “Early and forced marriage – as an actual problem of social life” of the commission on gender equality and women’s issues of Azerbaijan Trade Unions Confederation was held in Astara region.
At the event, which was organized by the Republican Committee of the Trade Union of Health Workers (SIHI RK), head of the Analytical Research Department of the AHCI on Cultural and Household Problems of Workers Namig Huseynov, representative of the State Committee on Family, Women and Children’s Problems Seymur Mammadov and Head of the sector for work with international organizations Roya Garayeva participated.
Elnara Muradova, the head of the organization department of the SIHI RK, the deputy chairperson of the commission on gender equality and women’s issues of the AHIK, who opened the event with an introduction, gave extensive information about early marriage, which is an actual problem of our society, and its consequences.
She said that this problem is more widespread in the southern zone of our republic, which seriously prevents young people from continuing their education. According to her, only 10% of young people who graduated from high school from this zone are girls.
Kamala Heydarova, the chairwoman of the Scientific Research Institute of Obstetrics and Gynecology, spoke about the medical approach to early marriage. Unfortunately, 70% of early pregnancies end in abortions, 15% result in miscarriages, and only 15% can have a normal birth.In early pregnancy, the risk of congenital physical and mental developmental defects is 11% higher. The diagnosis of “Oligophrenia” is 5 times higher in children born to teenage mothers.
Irada Khankishiyeva, the chairwoman of Sabail District Council of Education and Culture, in her turn, brought to the attention of the participants the statistical situation regarding early marriage in the world and in our country: “37.4% of early marriage is the desire of the parties, 25.9% is family insistence, 10.7 1% of them are caused by poor financial situation in the family, 7.9% by better financial situation of the other party, 6.4% by kidnapping and 1.6% by pregnancy.
Then, at the event, AHIK head of department Namig Huseynov, head of sector Röya Garayeva and representative of the State Committee on Family, Women and Children’s Problems Seymur Mammadov spoke about the provisions of the Azerbaijani legislation regarding early and forced marriage, the rules for combating illegal marriages, the international organizations’ work on women’s issues. they talked about the work done in connection with it, Convention No. 190 of the International Labor Organization, as well as the role of trade unions in gender policy and the steps taken by AHIK in this field. During the seminar, questions of interest to the participants were answered, opinions and suggestions were heard.