UK Court: Sharia marriages not valid under English law
"The Assembly is concerned that the rulings of the Sharia councils clearly discriminate against women in divorce and inheritance cases." — Council of Europe (COE), January 2019. However, as of now, neither the British government nor the British Parliament has introduced legislation that would require Muslims to conduct civil marriages before or at the same time as the nikah ceremony... " Pictured: The Royal Courts of Justice in London, seat of the Court of Appeal.
The Court of Appeal, the second-highest court in England and Wales after the Supreme Court, has ruled that the Islamic marriage contract, known as nikah in Arabic, is not valid under English law.
The court’s decision effectively reaffirms the principle that immigrants who settle in Britain must conform to British law, rather than the other way around.
The landmark ruling has far-reaching implications. On the one hand, the decision strikes a blow against efforts to enshrine this aspect of Sharia law into the British legal system. On the other hand, it leaves potentially thousands of Muslim women in Britain without legal recourse in the case of divorce.
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