The Taliban has issued a sweeping new family law regulation that recognises marriages involving minors as legally valid under certain circumstances, while placing significant restrictions on a child’s ability to seek annulment after reaching puberty.
The 31-article regulation, titled “Principles of Separation Between Spouses,” was published in the Taliban’s official gazette following approval by their leader Hibatullah Akhundzada.
The document lays out detailed rules governing the dissolution of marriages across a wide range of conditions, touching on child marriage, missing husbands, apostasy, forced separation, breastfeeding relations and accusations of adultery.
Child marriages given legal standing
One of the most scrutinised provisions concerns a classical Islamic jurisprudence concept known as “khiyar al-bulugh,” or the “option upon puberty,” which permits a child who was married at a young age to seek annulment after reaching adulthood.
Under Article 5 of the regulation, if relatives other than a child’s father or grandfather arrange the marriage of a minor — whether a boy or a girl — the marriage contract is deemed legally valid, provided the spouse is considered socially compatible and the dowry appropriate.
The child may later seek annulment after reaching puberty, but only through a court order.
A separate provision states that marriages involving a spouse deemed incompatible, or those with an excessively unfair dowry, would not be considered valid.
The regulation also gives fathers and grandfathers sweeping authority over child marriages, though it notes that such arrangements may be invalidated if the guardians in question are found to be abusive, mentally unfit or morally corrupt.
Women’s consent and court powers
Several provisions in the regulation reinforce conservative guardianship rules that directly affect women. Article 7 states that the silence of a virgin girl who has reached puberty may be interpreted as consent to marriage — a standard that does not apply to boys or previously married women, for whom silence does not automatically constitute agreement.
The regulation also empowers Taliban judges to intervene in marital disputes across a broad range of religious categories.
These include apostasy, prolonged absence of a husband, accusations of adultery, and “zihar” — a classical concept in which a husband compares his wife to a female relative whom marriage would be forbidden.
Under the zihar provisions, judges are authorised to compel husbands to fulfil religious penalties or grant divorce, and the document explicitly states that imprisonment and physical punishment may be used to enforce compliance.
Broader impact on Afghan women
Other sections of the regulation address marriages involving non-Muslims, covering scenarios where one spouse converts to Islam and the other does not, as well as marriages affected by breastfeeding relations — a concept in Islamic law under which individuals breastfed by the same woman are considered religious siblings and therefore prohibited from marrying one another.
The regulation also establishes procedures for women whose husbands have been missing for prolonged periods, allowing courts to intervene under specified conditions.
The publication of this new regulation comes as the Taliban continues to impose sweeping restrictions on women and girls since returning to power in August 2021.
Girls have been barred from schooling beyond sixth grade, women have been banned from universities, and severe curbs have been placed on women’s employment, movement and public participation.
The United Nations has repeatedly condemned these measures as systematic violations of fundamental rights.
Human rights advocates have expressed mounting concern that the Taliban is increasingly embedding hard-line legal interpretations into formal state regulations, further institutionalising gender-based restrictions through the machinery of the law.
