Bernie Sanders Hugs Muslim Student and Vows to Confront Islamophobia (VIDEO)

[Janelle2002 3,865]

Kidnapped and dragged to a forced wedding: Kazak bride screams as she is bundled out of car at new husband's home... as wedding music plays in background

• Bride kidnapping is an ancient custom in Kazakhstan, and is on the rise
• But local women's rights activist calls the practice 'barbaric'
• Perpetrators rarely face justice through the legal system

By DAMIEN GAYLE FOR MAILONLINE

PUBLISHED: 03:03 EST, 14 October 2014 | UPDATED: 08:30 EST, 14 October 2014

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Video footage of an abducted girl dragged screaming and crying into a forced wedding has shamed Kazakhstan.

The disturbing clip, filmed on a mobile phone and titled Stealing The Bride, shows the moment the teenage girl arrives at the home of her future husband in Kazakhstan's central Akmola region.

As wedding guests celebrate to traditional Kazakh music, the youngster sits in the back of a car crying and pleading to be taken home.

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Snatched: A young woman is dragged screaming and crying to the home of her future husband

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Forced wedding: The clip was filmed in Kazakhstan's Akmola region, where such abductions are a custom

In most countries, bride kidnapping is considered a sex crime. Local women's rights activist Anfisa Zuyeva, 30, called the practice 'barbaric'.

'No wonder people think we're backward,' she said.

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The video shows the screaming girl dragged from the car and along a special bridal carpet towards her suitor's house as guests in smart wedding dress throw confetti over her.

She makes one final effort at resistance at the door to the home, pushing back on the doorframe, before a crowd of men and women finally hustle her inside.

Girl is kidnapped and dragged to her future husband's house

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Smile for the camera: A relative of the groom can be seen shamelessly recording the moment for posterity

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Barbaric: The bride-to-be makes one last attempt at resistance before she is bundled through the door

Shockingly, such bride kidnapping, where a young woman is taken by force to the home of a man who wants to marry her, is said to be on the rise in Kazakhstan.

The groom-to-be hires relatives and friends who use deception or force to get the girl into their car. This can include offering to give her a lift, or dragging her off the street and tying her up in a sack.

Once inside the car she is driven to the man’s home where one of his female relatives prepares a special neckerchief called an Oramal which the girl must accept to show her consent to marriage.

Often it takes days of being locked up before the girl accepts and even then there are complicated politics to be dealt with when her family found out where she is.

The practice is an ancient custom in the region and there are various formalities to go through. In some circumstances the abduction can even be consensual.

Where it isn't, perpetrators are rarely dealt with by the legal system.

This latest video has been rounded on by critics who say the practice must stop.

Ms Zuyeva, who has campaigned against the tradition, said: 'This is a barbaric and evil practice that forces young girls into loveless marriages with men they hardly know.

'Often the families of the victims agree because the groom pays them a lot of money.

'But it is an outdated and horrific tradition which has no place in modern Kazakhstan.

MPs have now called for it to be made illegal, pointing out over 60 per cent of adults and 74 per cent of teenagers had either been victims of kidnappings or knew people who were.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2792041/kidnapped-dragged-forced-wedding-bride-screams-bundled-car-home-new-husband-wedding-music-plays-background.html#ixzz3r0plFhQ1

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[Janelle2002 3,865]

Since the break from Soviet rule and the reversion back to old tradition and cultural pride under Islam in 1991, bride kidnapping has steadily risen. And although bride-napping is illegal, most villages in Kyrgyzstan operate under de facto ruled councils which aren’t necessarily bound to state legal practices. The councils don’t seem to take the crime seriously, despite the large numbers of spousal violence, divorce and suicide as a result of the marriages.

Yeah. Next.

Yeap, blame Islam because this was a Soviet, originated practice happening in Christian countries. Kyrgystan is part Muslim part Russian Orthodox. Bridal Kidnapping is practiced there by the locals.

watch video >>

For centuries, Kyrgyzstan was a remote, mountainous outpost along the Silk Road to China. Under Soviet rule, few Westerners ventured here. But since the country gained independence in 1991, Kyrgyzstan is slowly opening to the West.

FRONTLINE/WORLD correspondent Petr Lom -- a professor at Central European University in Budapest -- first traveled to Kyrgyzstan to investigate Islamic extremism. But he stumbled across a strange local custom, which he decided to explore.

With his translator and friend Fatima Sartbaeva, a young Kyrgyz woman, as his guide, Lom sets out on a journey of discovery, driving deep into the countryside to a small village just outside the ancient city of Osh.

Petr and Fatima arrive as a wedding is about to begin. Women are busy making traditional Kyrgyz bread for the occasion, and men sit in chairs outside, talking and sipping tea. The groom confesses he has had some difficulty finding a bride, but he is hopeful that "this one will stay."

When the bride does arrive, she is dragged into the groom's house, struggling and crying. Her name is Norkuz, and it turns out she has been kidnapped from her home about a mile away.

Fatima had prepared Petr for this scene, telling him that the custom of bride kidnapping is shocking, but he is still stunned by what he is seeing.

As the women of the groom's family surround Norkuz and hold down both of her hands, they are at once forceful and comforting, informing her that they, too, were kidnapped. The kidnappers insist that they negotiated the abduction with Norkuz's brother, but her sister, a lawyer from Osh, arrives to protest that her sister is being forced to marry a stranger. Ideally in Kyrgyz circles, a bride's family gets a price for their daughter, but Norkuz is 25 -- considered late to marry -- and the women remind her she is lucky she was kidnapped at all.

Within the space of an hour, Norkuz struggles less, looking exhausted but laughing along with the women who have placed a scarf on her head. Tradition dicates that once the bride accepts the ceremonial scarf, the matter is settled and the wedding can commence. Norkuz relents.

A few days later Petr and Fatima return to see how Norkuz and her new husband are doing.

"Only one in 100 Kyrgyz girls marries her true love," Norkuz tells them as she cleans her new home. "After the kidnapping, you've no choice. You start loving, even if you don't want to. You have to build a life."

Having finally found himself a wife, the groom seems pleased. "We're happy," he says. "Keep visiting and we'll be happier."

Petr learns that the origins of this strange custom are murky: "Some say Kyrgyz men used to snatch their brides on horseback. Now they use cars, and if a villager doesn't have a car, he hires a taxi for the day."

Petr and Fatima speak with a taxi driver in Osh who says he helped kidnap a girl earlier that same day. During Soviet times, bride kidnapping was banned, but in the past decade, the old tradition has revived, especially in rural areas.

Jumankul, 19, is under pressure from his parents to marry and bring home a wife who can help work on the family farm. Jumankul tells Petr and Fatima that he's seen a girl in Osh whom he likes and plans to drive to the city in a few hours to kidnap her.

"We can't afford her hand," says Jumankul's father. "They wanted too much money."

The family has hired a taxi to drive Jumankul to Osh where he and his friends plan to find and kidnap the girl he has seen at a bazaar. But when they get to Osh, Jumankul can't find the girl. The group drops by a vodka stand to try to find out where she lives, but the girl working there suspects a kidnapping and refuses to tell Jumankul's brother, Ulan, the address of the girl. "Find it yourself," she tells him.

Not wanting to return home empty-handed, Jumankul and his friends decide to change plans and kidnap the girl in the vodka bar.

Her name is Ainagul, and by the time Petr and Fatima return to Jumankul's village outside of Osh, she has been resisting a room full of women for more than ten hours. Though Jumankul's older brother claims her family has already agreed to the kidnapping, Ainagul stands in a corner of the room, crying, and continuing to fend off the women who take turns trying to put the wedding scarf on her head.

"It'll be over soon," Jumankul's brother, Ulan, tells Petr. "You'll see."

But Ainagul puts up a strong fight, and the women tire of trying to convince her. After the oldest woman in the village makes a final attempt, telling Ainagul to stay or she will be unhappy, the women give up. Her ordeal over, Ainagul is free to go.

Once she has left, the women sit outside Jumankul's home and curse the departed girl. They say that her child will be a drunk and that her mother-in-law will be cruel. Jumankul, too, is upset and worries that he will never find a bride who will stay.

Petr and Fatima catch up with Ainagul two weeks later in Osh, where she is living with relatives.

"Because of what people say, you think you should stay," Ainagul tells them, sitting at a table. She is still shaken from the experience, looking down while she speaks. "But no one lives your life. You build your own future. Follow others, you'll be unhappy. I'd have lived in the mountains and tended sheep. I'd be a sheep too. I would waste my life."

Fatima identifies with Ainagul's hope to make a life of her own. Fatima confides to Petr that she herself was nearly kidnapped before she met her husband, an instructor at the American University in the capital, Bishkek. She says that her mother wanted a Kyrgyz man to kidnap her so she wouldn't study at the university and one day perhaps leave the country to live abroad.

Fatima's mother was kidnapped as well. In Balykchy, Fatima sits down with her mother to talk about bride kidnapping.

"Even though we want to stop violence against women and support gender rights we still practice bride kidnapping. My parents followed this custom even during Soviet times," Fatima's mother tells her daughter and Petr. "If my daughter was stolen by a man that I didn't want or know, I would be disappointed but I wouldn't reject our tradition; it is a part of us, our custom, our mentality."

In the most disturbing case of all, Petr and Fatima learn of a girl, Kyal, who was kidnapped from outside her home, then died. Four days after the kidnapping, her father picked up her body from a village a few hours away. She'd hanged herself. Though it isn't clear exactly what happened, Kyal's father has a theory.

"I think they kidnapped her," he tells Petr and Fatima. "And she refused to stay. Maybe she resisted and was raped, so she hanged herself." Even though the groom's family does not admit to any wrongdoing, Kyal's father wants to see an investigation. Though a widely practiced tradition, bride kidnapping has been illegal in Kyrgyzstan since 1994, but the law is rarely enforced. Kyal's grief-stricken family prays for justice.

"In one of the poorest countries in Central Asia, bride kidnapping is not high on the agenda for reform," observes reporter Petr Lom.

Back in the city, Petr and Fatima make one last stop to check in on a man whom, earlier in their filming, they watched attempt to kidnap a bride. After the girl refused to stay and was eventually let go, the groom kidnapped another girl the next day. This bride stayed.

By the time Petr and Fatima return to visit the groom and his new wife, it has been four months since the marriage. The couple stands together in a light snowfall, laughing with each other. The woman is two months pregnant.

"I have a husband. Before I got married, I was alone," she tells the visitors. "Now I have someone to take care of and to dream with." As the couple bids Petr and Fatima farewell, Fatima -- a university-educated woman who escaped being kidnapped -- wrestles with more complicated, conflicted feelings about this Kyrgyz tradition. In this case, at least, the couple seems happy.

[JohnR! 5,495]

Blaming Islam for everything provides good cover and deflection from the issues created by Islam sister religions Christianity and Judeism.

While the motley crew shows feigned outrage at these practices, they can celebrate xmas, with all those goods made in China, by quasi-slave workers, working and living in sub-human conditions. But seriously, who cares, so long as they can celebrate their mythological beliefs, in a celebration that had nothing to do with exploitation and commerce, until the recent era. Islamophobia affords them that cover. By the same token, while they seek a narrative that fits their prejudice, they ignore the fate of thousands of Palestinian children who are being robbed of their childhood and innocence by invaders and overlords. But again, who cares, when everyone is so busy preparing to celebrate all the love that comes from god? Who has time for these pesky realities, when Islamophobia provides such a great cloak?

Sister religions. Same god. Same modus operandi.

Yeap, blame Islam because this was a Soviet, originated practice happening in Christian countries. Kyrgystan is part Muslim part Russian Orthodox. Bridal Kidnapping is practiced there by the locals.

[Janelle2002 3,865]

China practices bridal kidnapping too.

Market for Brides

BY MELANIE KIRKPATRICK 8/20/12 AT 1:00 AM

North Korea WORLD

A missionary on the lookout for North Korean refugees in Yanbian. CHIEN-CHI CHANG / MAGNUM

FILED UNDER: World

Steven Kim, an American businessman from Long Island, New York, may be the worlds leading expert on the market for North Korean brides. He acquired this expertise accidentally. He likes to say it was Gods plan.

A decade or so ago he was living in China, overseeing the manufacture of chairs he sold to retail clients in the United States, when he heard about a secret church that catered to the South Korean businessmen who worked in the Shenzhen industrial zone, not far from his apartment. It wasnt registered with the Chinese government, as required by law, so it operated underground, billing itself as a cultural association. There was no sign on the door and no cross on the roof. The 100 or so congregants had learned about the church as Kim had, by word of mouth.

Kim, a practicing Christian, became a regular attendee. One Sunday he noticed two shabbily dressed men seated in a corner of the room. After worship, he went up to them, said hello, and learned to his astonishment that they were from North Korea. They had escaped across the Tumen River to northeast China and traveled 2,000 miles south to Guangdong province, a journey that took two months. They hoped to find a way to slip across the border into Hong Kong. They came to church asking for help, he says. But the church would only feed them, give them a few dollars, and let them go.

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Kim was outraged. I asked the pastor, Why do you let them go? Because were afraid, the pastor replied. If were caught helping North Koreans, the church will be shut down. Kim took the two men home.

That was the start. Kim began to assist North Korean refugees clandestinely. He provided safe houses, food, clothing, and money; eventually he organized secret passage across China to third countries. Before long, he gained a reputation along the new underground railroad as someone North Koreans could count on for assistance. Many of them turned out to be women fleeing from the Chinese men who had purchased them as brides.

Today he runs 318 Partners, a U.S.-based nonprofit dedicated to rescuing trafficked women in China. Its named after Article 318 of the Chinese criminal code, the law under which Kim was arrested in September 2003 as he led nine North Koreans in a prayer meeting at his apartment. Convicted of helping illegal migrants, he spent four years in a Chinese prison. His home office now, on a quiet street on suburban Long Island, is a luxurious contrast to the Chinese prison cell he shared with a dozen felons. On the morning of my visit, his cellphone rings repeatedly with calls from South Korea, China, and Southeast Asia regarding a rescue operation in the works. It is not until lunchtime, when most of Asia is asleep, that his phone finally goes quiet.

Kim clearly has his hands full. The only practical escape route for fugitives from North Korea is through China, and human-rights groups say roughly 80 percent of those thousands of refugees are women and girls who have become commodities for purchase, in Kims words. The most popular marketplaces are in the three Chinese provinces closest to the North Korean borderLiaoning, Jilin, and Heilongjiangbut North Korean brides are sold to men throughout China. Many of the buyers are farmers. Some have physical or mental disabilities that make them unsuitable as husbands in the eyes of Chinese women. In almost every case, the men are buying the one thing they want most in life: a wife.

But why import brides from North Korea? The answer is Chinas family-planning laws. Ever since the one-child policy went into effect in 1979, Beijing has enforced it through fines, imprisonment, forced abortion, sterilization, and even, human-rights groups charge, infanticide. The policy has had its intended effect of slowing the rate of expansion of Chinas population. But there has been an unwelcome side effect: an unnaturally high male-to-female ratio.

[The Nature Boy 7,659]

China does it too.

It's all good now

[Janelle2002 3,865]

China does it too.

It's all good now

No constructive input, ey?

[The Nature Boy 7,659]

No constructive input, ey?

I thought it was ..

Two wrongs don't make a right my momma used to say

[Janelle2002 3,865]

I thought it was ..

Two wrongs don't make a right my momma used to say

I agree. However, you guys are the ones pretending non-Islamic countries don't have problems. Not me. I'm just pointing out the hypocrisy, idiocracy and flaws in yall theories.

[The Nature Boy 7,659]

I agree. However, you guys are the ones pretending non-Islamic countries don't have problems. Not me. I'm just pointing out the hypocrisy, idiocracy and flaws in yall theories.

No one ever said non Islamic countries don't have problems. I think they are saying just saying that things like oppression of women are more prevalent in many Islamic contries.

[We Keep Receipts 9,238]

Didn't say you were African. Said slavery is openly practiced in the Muslim controlled areas of Africa. Why would that simple and factual comment make you feel so defensive? Religion is a set of beliefs and teachings, and the beliefs and teachings that you say you practice are the same beliefs and teachings that justify slavery and mistreatment of women. Shared beliefs and teachings and practices is not the same as shared race. Dunno why you would identify with the African slaveholders so strongly LOL.

Those 6.67 million are not in charge. Get the difference?

Russia is a christian country? Bridal kidnapping is written into Russian law? Copy and paste that law please. Please go get it.

Because what did you say? Oh yeah:

For that matter, and speaking of, you really don't have any room to talk about slavery either. Slavery is openly practiced in Africa, today, under Islamic law. For all of your comments about slavery 100+ years ago in the US I wonder why you identify with the beliefs in the last places on the planet where slavery is openly practiced and justified, because of those beliefs and teachings.

What does the practice in Africa have to do with me? I ask again because you said I have no room to talk. Like I'm doing the same thing or something, can you please clarify?

Says the man who declared he is a Muslim why? My guess is this:

It is not permissible for a Muslim woman to marry a kaafir (non-Muslim), whether he is Jewish, Christian or an idol-worshipper, because the man has authority over his wife, and it is not permissible for a kaafir to have authority over a Muslim woman. For Islam is the true religion and all other religions are false. Allaah says (interpretation of the meaning):

“And give not (your daughters) in marriage to Al-Mushrikoon till they believe (in Allaah Alone)” [al-Baqarah 2:221]

“And never will Allaah grant to the disbelievers a way (to triumph) over the believers” [al-Nisaa’ 4:141]

And the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him) said: “Islam should prevail and should not be prevailed over.”

If a Muslim woman marries a kaafir when she knows the ruling, then she is a zaaniyah (adulteress), and her punishment is the punishment for adultery. If she was ignorant of the ruling then she is excused, but they must be separated, and there is no need for a divorce because the marriage is null and void. On this basis, the Muslim woman whom Allaah has honoured with Islam and her guardian must beware of that and must adhere to the limits set by Allaah, and they must feel proud of Islam. Allaah says (interpretation of the meaning):

“Those who take disbelievers for Awliyaa’ (protectors or helpers or friends) instead of believers, do they seek honour, power and glory with them? Verily, then to Allaah belongs all honour, power and glory” [al-Nisaa’ 4:139]

But he's offended because people who think they should be free to make basic decisions, like choose who to marry, regardless of race or religion, are concerned about putting people who practice these beliefs in charge.

SMH. Anyone want to guess what the Islamic punishment for adultery is? Again, irony at its highest and most pure form. Forcing a religion to allow a marriage is a form of slavery in itself.

The seriousness of the sin of adultery can be seen in several ways. Under the law of Moses the penalty was death by stoning. (Deuteronomy 22:21 ff, John 8:4,5)

That's in the bible. But anyway, I identified as Muslim because in order to get married to a Muslim woman I converted. Is there a problem with that?

[Janelle2002 3,865]

No one ever said non Islamic countries don't have problems. I think they are saying just saying that things like oppression of women are more prevalent in many Islamic contries.

Again, you can only focus on Islam and blatantly ignore what's happening to women in other countries because you can't say it's happening in the name of Islam. Ok. I understand. We are going to ignore the little girls and little baby girls in China being sold on the black market because it's not being done in the name of Allah.

Like I said, hypocrisy.

[Boiler 46,232]

How can it be oppression if it is Sharia?

[Expat1 971]

That's in the bible. But anyway, I identified as Muslim because in order to get married to a Muslim woman I converted. Is there a problem with that?

I already said you got converted because if you didn't your wife would be, under the Islamic law, an adulteress, subject to penalty for adultery, and your marriage would not be considered valid, under Islamic law, if you did not.

That is barbaric.

Referencing ancient Mosaic law from the bible and comparing it to what you did and why you had to do it is a joke.

There is no problem with what you did, but there is a HUGE problem with you labeling anyone who does not want that cruel, backwards, barbaric belief system and the treatment of women under that belief system exported to the US as an "Islamophobe".

You have the same credibility by embracing that belief system then coming on this talking about women's rights and gay rights as I would by moving home, settling in rural Alabama, joining the KKK and participating in all their rituals and events, then dressing in my robe and hood and giving civil rights speeches while I run for office in Detroit or Chicago. If you can imagine in your mind how stupid that would sound and look.........that's what a self-identified Muslim looks like waving the flag of gay rights, women's rights, and freedom. Especially one who was forced to convert for marriage reasons. That's what this discussion is about and that's the only thing this discussion is about. You need to represent something other than that before you start labeling GOP voters.

What does the practice in Africa have to do with me? I ask again because you said I have no room to talk. Like I'm doing the same thing or something, can you please clarify?

The practice in Africa is based on Islamic law and Islamic principle. You are a self-identified Muslim. Figure it out. Hint: It's not skin color.

Edited November 9, 2015 by Expat1

[We Keep Receipts 9,238]

I already said you got converted because if you didn't your wife would be, under the Islamic law, an adulteress, subject to penalty for adultery, and your marriage would not be considered valid, under Islamic law, if you did not.

That is barbaric.

Referencing ancient Mosaic law from the bible and comparing it to what you did and why you had to do it is a joke.

There is no problem with what you did, but there is a HUGE problem with you labeling anyone who does not want that cruel, backwards, barbaric belief system and the treatment of women under that belief system exported to the US as an "Islamophobe".

You have the same credibility by embracing that belief system then coming on this talking about women's rights and gay rights as I would by moving home, settling in rural Alabama, joining the KKK and participating in all their rituals and events, then dressing in my robe and hood and giving civil rights speeches while I run for office in Detroit or Chicago. If you can imagine in your mind how stupid that would sound and look.........that's what a self-identified Muslim looks like waving the flag of gay rights, women's rights, and freedom. Especially one who was forced to convert for marriage reasons. That's what this discussion is about and that's the only thing this discussion is about. You need to represent something other than that before you start labeling GOP voters.

If I were still a Muslim, and ran for the President of the United States, does that mean I would uphold Sharia law if elected?

And for the record, I wasn't forced to convert. I made the choice on my own. I did the research and knew what I was getting into before I made the switch.

So you're comparing all Muslims to those that do these barbaric things?

Edited November 9, 2015 by Stay Woke

[Expat1 971]

Again, you can only focus on Islam and blatantly ignore what's happening to women in other countries because you can't say it's happening in the name of Islam. Ok. I understand. We are going to ignore the little girls and little baby girls in China being sold on the black market because it's not being done in the name of Allah.

Like I said, hypocrisy.

You're not the one who gets to see the religious police knock some girl around in the mall because too much of her face is showing or she wore too much makeup. Hypocrisy is defending the only one in this room who labels "islamophobe" to anyone who does not want to export that to the US and vote for it.