She is only 25... When she saw us, her
face lit up with a smile. She told me that she had two kids and needed child
care to be able to come to the meeting.
I asked her, her story. She told me
that she got married by religious ceremony at 17 with her own consent. Her
family was quite wealthy, so she had had a very good life until she got
married.
When she arrived at her new home, her
in-laws started to use her like a slave. They told her she was their property.
She had to work from dawn to dusk every day, even when she was pregnant. Her
husband was very weak-willed against the mistreatment of his wife. He didn’t do
anything to stop it.
Her in-laws forbade her to call any of
her parents, relatives or friends. They wanted her to work for them incessantly.
They also used to abuse her both physically and verbally. They even tried to
persuade their son that the child was not his.
Her in-laws were quite upset when her
best friend came to visit her one day. Her mother-in-law gave her a mobile
phone so she could check her whereabouts when she went out with her
friend. What she didn’t know was that her father was
very worried about her and he had arranged for her to escape with her child
with the help of her best friend.
She had to leave at night in order to
be able to reach the UK. She didn’t know if she was going to be accepted as a
refugee, so she experienced a terrible couple of years.
As her husband’s dad is politically strong
in the country, she still lives in constant fear of being tracked down and
murdered by her in-laws.
