AFP, Madyan for Al Arabiya News
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 “honor.” She was five years old.A few months earlier, Saneeda’s father Ali Ahmed had eloped with a girl from another valley. To avoid violent revenge from her family, he promised to give them his daughter and niece Sapna in marriage.
Offering young girls as brides in compensation to settle disputes persists in many areas of deeply conservative Pakistan.