「ジョギング中だったけど、足が凍り付きました」
ウエディングドレスを着た幼い少女が、祖父と同じぐらいの年の花婿と一緒に写真を撮っているのを見て、現場に居合わせた一人はそう語った。
2人を撮影した動画は、レバノンの女性人権団体Kafaが作成した。ショックを受けている人たちがいる一方で、男性を祝福する通行人も多く見られる。
レバノン政府は、国連で1979年に採択された「女子に対するあらゆる形態の差別の撤廃に関する条約（女子差別撤廃条約）」第16条を導入していない。第16条は「男女が平等に配偶者を選ぶ権利、結婚する権利、家の管理をする権利」を国が国民に与えるよう定めている。
Kafaはこの政府の姿勢を4年にわたって抗議している。今回の写真撮影は、レバノンの人々が児童結婚についてどう考えているかを調べるための社会実験として行われた。ちなみにKafaとはアラビア語で「もう十分」という意味だ。
レバノンの児童婚問題に目を向けてもらうため、幼い少女とはるか年上の男性が結婚写真を撮影している動画を作成した。（KAFA/YOUTUBE）
2014年に国連児童基金（ユニセフ）が発表したレポートによれば、レバノンでは少女の6%が18歳になる前に結婚していて、そのうち1%が15歳未満だ。また世界中では毎年1500万人の少女が18歳の誕生日を迎える前に結婚している。
インディペンデント紙によれば、レバノンでは親の同意なしに法的に結婚できる年齢は、女性は17歳で男性が18歳だ。しかし、親の同意があれば9歳の女児でも結婚が可能だと、男女平等の権利に関するデータを集める「ワールド・ポリシー・アナリシス・センター」は伝えている。
児童婚を規制する法案を検討していることを、レバノン政府は2014年に発表した。しかし宗教グループは、家族を政府が定める結婚法から免除できる。世界的な人権団体「Girls Not Brides（少女を花嫁にしない）」によれば、レバノンでは、宗教コミュニティによって結婚や身分についての法律が違うと言う。
子供の花嫁は性的虐待やDVを受けやすい、と世界保健機関 （WHO）の報告書は伝えている。また、20歳以下の母親から生まれる赤ちゃんは、20代の母親から生まれる赤ちゃんより、生後数週間以内に死亡する率が50%高い。さらに「Girls Not Brides（少女を花嫁にしない）」は 出産時に15歳以下の少女が死亡する確率は20～24歳の女性の5倍だと警告している。
この記事はハフポストUS版に掲載されたものを翻訳しました。
強制結婚
(FILES) In this picture taken 30 April 2(01 of16)
Funda, INDIA: (FILES) In this picture taken 30 April 2006, Young Indian men (REAR) and women (FRONT) are paraded before a mass wedding ceremony during which some 50 youths and young women under the age of eighteen were married on the occassion of \'Akshya Tritya\'. in the village of Funda, some 30kms from Bhopal. The Indian parliament 19 December 2006, enacted a law to nullify child marriages if a minor girl complains she is forced into wedlock.Parliament\'s elected lower house voted the Prohibition of Child Marriages Prevention Bill into law which stipulates that each of India\'s 29 states must appoint special officials to help combat the scourge. Under an existing Indian law, the minimum age for marriage is 18 for women and 21 for men, but thousands of children -- some as young as five -- are married every year in rural areas. AFP PHOTO/STR/FILES (Photo credit should read STRDEL/AFP/Getty Images) (credit:STRDEL via Getty Images)
A peasant woman with her children takes(02 of16)
A peasant woman with her children takes part in a demonstration for the International Women\'s Day at the Heroes\' Pantheon in Asucion on March 8, 2008. Calls to end forced marriage, domestic abuse and job discrimination marked International Women\'s Day on Saturday as demonstrators took to the streets worldwide. AFP PHOTO NORBERTO DUARTE (Photo credit should read NORBERTO DUARTE/AFP/Getty Images) (credit:NORBERTO DUARTE via Getty Images)
Yemeni child Nojoud Mohammed Ali and her(03 of16)
Yemeni child Nojoud Mohammed Ali and her lawyer Shatha Mohammed Nasser are seen at a courthouse in Sanaa on April 15, 2008. A Yemeni court granted a divorce today to the eight-year-old Nojoud, whose unemployed father forced her into an arranged marriage this year, saying he feared she might be kidnapped. AFP PHOTO/KHALED FAZAA (Photo credit should read KHALED FAZAA/AFP/Getty Images) (credit:KHALED FAZAA via Getty Images)
Yemeni child Nojoud Mohammed Ali (2nd R)(04 of16)
Yemeni child Nojoud Mohammed Ali (2nd R), her lawyer Shatha Mohammed Nasser (2nd L), father Mohammed Ali Al-Ahdal (R) and husband Faez Ali Thameur (L) attend a public hearing regarding the young girl\'s arranged marriage at a court in Sanaa on April 15, 2008. A Yemeni court granted a divorce today to the eight-year-old Nojoud, whose unemployed father forced her into an arranged marriage this year, saying he feared she might be kidnapped. AFP PHOTO/KHALED FAZAA (Photo credit should read KHALED FAZAA/AFP/Getty Images) (credit:KHALED FAZAA via Getty Images)
Victims Of Forced Marriage In Burkina Faso(05 of16)
KAYA, BURKINA FASO - MARCH 06: Refuge welcomes 50 girls illiterate, victims of forced marriage. They often spend several years and has taught reading and writing, cooking, gardening and sewing. Two young girls aged 16, on March 6, 2009 in Kaya, Burkina Faso. (Photo by Pascal Parrot/Getty Images) (credit:Pascal Parrot via Getty Images)
Victims Of Forced Marriage In Burkina Faso(06 of16)
KAYA, BURKINA FASO - MARCH 06: Refuge welcomes 50 girls illiterate, victims of forced marriage. They often spend several years and has taught reading and writing, cooking, gardening and sewing. After school time, on March 6, 2009 in Kaya, Burkina Faso. (Photo by Pascal Parrot/Getty Images) (credit:Pascal Parrot via Getty Images)
Victims Of Forced Marriage In Burkina Faso(07 of16)
KAYA, BURKINA FASO - MARCH 06: Refuge welcomes 50 girls illiterate, victims of forced marriage. They often spend several years and has taught reading and writing, cooking, gardening and sewing. Two young girls born in 1992, in the refuge since year 2006, on March 6, 2009 in Kaya, Burkina Faso. (Photo by Pascal Parrot/Getty Images) (credit:Pascal Parrot via Getty Images)
Victims Of Forced Marriage In Burkina Faso(08 of16)
KAYA, BURKINA FASO - MARCH 06: Refuge welcomes 50 girls illiterate, victims of forced marriage. They often spend several years and has taught reading and writing, cooking, gardening and sewing. Sister Augustine, manager of the refuge, on March 6, 2009 in Kaya, Burkina Faso. (Photo by Pascal Parrot/Getty Images) (credit:Pascal Parrot via Getty Images)
Yemeni former child-bride Nujud Mohammed(09 of16)
Yemeni former child-bride Nujud Mohammed Ali participates in a demonstration to support proposed legislation banning the marriage of girls under 17, outside the parliament in Sanaa on March 23, 2010. Ali was granted a divorce in 2008 at the age of eight after her unemployed father forced her into an arranged marriage with a man twenty years her senior. AFP PHOTO/MOHAMED HUWAIS (Photo credit should read MOHAMED HUWAIS/AFP/Getty Images) (credit:AFP via Getty Images)
Bamiyan Shelter Cares For Battered Afghan Women(10 of16)
BAMIYAN, AFGHANISTAN - OCTOBER 8: Bas Gul, 17, resides at a women\'s shelter and safe house October 7, 2010 in Bamiyan, Afghanistan. She was a child bride, forced to marry at age 11, and ran away after five years of marriage to the boy, who was only five years old at the time of the marriage. Until women\'s shelters were started, something that was unknown here before 2003, a woman in an abusive marriage usually had no one to go to for protection. The problems many battered and abused women are confronting are deeply ingrained in a culture that has mainly been governed by tribal law. Since the overthrow of the Taliban in 2001, a more concrete idea of women\'s rights has begun to take hold, promoted by the newly created Ministry of Women\'s Affairs and a small community of women\'s advocates. (Photo by Paula Bronstein/Getty Images) (credit:Paula Bronstein via Getty Images)
This picture taken in Kabul on October 1(11 of16)
This picture taken in Kabul on October 12, 2011 shows an Afghan child at a shelter run by women for Afghan women. In the war-torn country, Afghan women often oppressed by poverty, family disputes, forced marriage or discrimination. Women\'s right in Afghanistan risk being forgotten as international troops withdraw and the government struggles for a peace deal 10 years after the Taliban were ousted, report by Oxfam and ActionAid said. AFP PHOTO / ADEK BERRY (Photo credit should read ADEK BERRY/AFP/Getty Images) (credit:ADEK BERRY via Getty Images)
YEMEN-SOCIETY-WOMEN-CHILDREN-MARRIAGE(12 of16)
TO GO WITH AFP STORY BY SAMI AL-ANSI \nA picture taken on October 7, 2013 shows ten to fifteen-year-old Yemeni girls sitting at their school in the capital Sanaa. Child brides,\' or \'death brides\' as they are sometimes called, are quite common in poor tribal Yemen, where barely pubescent girls are forced into marriage, often to much older men. AFP PHOTO/ MOHAMMED HUWAIS (Photo credit should read MOHAMMED HUWAIS/AFP/Getty Images) (credit:MOHAMMED HUWAIS via Getty Images)
PAKISTAN-UNREST-WOMEN-MARRIAGES-CHILDREN(13 of16)
To go with \'Pakistan-unrest-women-marriages-Children-social, FEATURE\' by Khurram SHAHZAD\nIn this photograph taken on December 12, 2013 young Pakistani girl Saneeda, who escaped a forced marriage under a local custom of Swara, plays a local game in the Madyan valley of Swat, in the country\'s northwest. One sunny afternoon as she skipped home from school, Saneeda was accosted by her estranged father, who wanted to marry her to a man she\'d never met to settle a debt of \'honour\'. She was five years old. Offering young girls as brides in compensation to settle disputes persists in many areas of deeply conservative Pakistan. AFP PHOTO/Aamir QURESHI (Photo credit should read AAMIR QURESHI/AFP/Getty Images) (credit:AAMIR QURESHI via Getty Images)
YEMEN-GENDER-MARRIAGE-FILM(14 of16)
Yemeni women attend the showing of a film in Sanaa March 3, 2014 about \'child brides\', which are quite common in the poverty-striken and tribal country of Yemen, where barely pubescent adolescent girls are forced into marriage, often to older men. It is estimated that 14 % of girls in Yemen under the age of 15 are forced into early marriages and 52% of girls before they turn 18, and frequently to much older husbands according to rights organisations. AFP PHOTO/ MOHAMMED HUWAIS (Photo credit should read MOHAMMED HUWAIS/AFP/Getty Images) (credit:MOHAMMED HUWAIS via Getty Images)
YEMEN-GENDER-MARRIAGE-FILM(15 of16)
A Yemeni woman attends the showing of a film in Sanaa March 3, 2014 about \'child brides\', which are quite common in the poverty-striken and tribal country of Yemen, where barely pubescent adolescent girls are forced into marriage, often to older men. It is estimated that 14 % of girls in Yemen under the age of 15 are forced into early marriages and 52% of girls before they turn 18, and frequently to much older husbands according to rights organisations. AFP PHOTO/ MOHAMMED HUWAIS (Photo credit should read MOHAMMED HUWAIS/AFP/Getty Images) (credit:MOHAMMED HUWAIS via Getty Images)
YEMEN-GENDER-MARRIAGE-FILM(16 of16)
Yemeni women attend the showing of a film in Sanaa March 3, 2014 about \'child brides\', which are quite common in the poverty-striken and tribal country of Yemen, where barely pubescent adolescent girls are forced into marriage, often to older men. It is estimated that 14 % of girls in Yemen under the age of 15 are forced into early marriages and 52% of girls before they turn 18, and frequently to much older husbands according to rights organisations. AFP PHOTO/ MOHAMMED HUWAIS (Photo credit should read MOHAMMED HUWAIS/AFP/Getty Images) (credit:MOHAMMED HUWAIS via Getty Images)
【関連記事】
ハフィントンポスト日本版はTwitterでも情報発信しています。@HuffPostJapan をフォロー