The governing coalition says the move aligns with a strict interpretation of Islamic law and is intended to protect young girls from “immoral relationships”.
The second reading of the amendment to Law 188 was passed on September 16.
It isn’t the first time Shia parties in Iraq have tried to amend the personal status law – attempts to change it failed in 2014 and 2017, largely due to a backlash from Iraqi women.
But the coalition now has a large parliamentary majority and is on the brink of pushing the amendment over the line, said Dr Renad Mansour, a senior research fellow at Chatham House.
“It’s the closest it’s ever been,” he told The Telegraph. “It has more momentum than it’s ever had, primarily because of the Shia parties,” he said.
“It’s not all Shia parties, it’s just the specific ones that are empowered and are really pushing it.”
Dr Renad added that the proposed amendment was part of a wider political move by Shia Islamist groups to “consolidate their power” and regain legitimacy.
“Stressing the religious side is a way for them to try and regain some of the ideological legitimacy that has been waning over the last few years,” he told The Telegraph.
It is not yet clear exactly when the amendment will go before parliament for a vote, but it could come at any moment, he said.
An attack on women, girls… and Iraq’s social fabric
Experts and activists say the amendment would effectively erase the most important rights of women in the country.
“The amendment would not just undermine these rights,” said Sarah Sanbar, Iraq researcher at Human Rights Watch. “It would erase them.”
Athraa Al-Hassan, international human rights legal adviser and director of Model Iraqi Woman, told The Telegraph she is “afraid” Iraq’s system of governance will be replaced with a new system known as the Guardianship of the Jurist – a Shia system that puts religious rule above the state.
The system is the same one that underpins the regimes in Afghanistan and Iran, where a Guardian Jurist serves as supreme leader of the country.
Iraq already has high rates of child marriage. According to the United Nations Children’s Fund (Unicef), some 28 per cent of women in Iraq are married by 18.
This is because of a loophole in the personal status law which allows religious leaders, instead of the courts, to officiate thousands of marriages each year – including those involving girls as young as 15, with permission from the father.
These unregistered marriages are widespread in economically poor, ultra-conservative Shia communities in Iraq.
But because the nuptials are not recognised by law, the girls and any children they have are denied a plethora of rights.
For example, hospitals can refuse women admitted for childbirth without a marriage certificate.
The amendment would legitimise these religious marriages, putting young girls at increased risk of sexual and physical violence, as well as being denied access to education and employment, according to human rights watch.