Germany’s top court: law on child marriages must be amended

BERLIN (Reuters) – Germany’s Constitutional Court ruled on Wednesday that a law declaring marriages entered into by children under the age of 16 outside of Germany illegal must be amended.

The law must include regulations allowing the marriage to be declared valid once the individual in question has reached adulthood, as well as rules on alimony payments, the court said in a statement.

The law must be amended by June 30, 2024, to bring it in line with the constitution, it added.

The case relates to a Syrian couple whose marriage was declared invalid upon their arrival in Germany as refugees. The then 14-year-old girl had married a man seven years her senior in a Sharia court in Syria in 2015.

After arriving in Germany, the teen was separated from her husband and placed in a facility for female refugees.

(This story has been corrected to add the dropped word “illegal” in paragraph 1)

(Reporting by Friederike Heine, Editing by Rachel More)