A "sectarian" bill that could potentially legitimise child marriage in Iraq has passed into law reportedly without a vote in the parliament

The parliamentary website said "the proposal to amend the Personal Status Law" and "the second amendment of the general amnesty law" were both passed on Tuesday[…]
The new law will require a Muslim couple to choose either the Sunni or Shia sect when concluding a marriage contract

They can then choose that sect to represent them in "all matters of personal status" rather than the civil judiciary

Previous versions of the bill - typically shelved after public outcry - explicitly called for nine-year-olds to be legally married, something legal experts have warned could be permitted under Jaafari jurisprudence, an interpretation of religious law followed by some Shia[…]
MP Mohamed Anouz told AFP that a revised version of the bill reinstated clauses of the old law that set the age of marriage at 18 or 15, with the consent of legal guardians and a judge[…]
Women's and civil rights campaigners have warned about the impact of the legislation on women and families[…]
Previous versions of the bill have included rules preventing Muslim men from marrying non-Muslims, the legalisation of marital rape and banning women from leaving the house without their husband's permission

The latest version is considerably less explicit, but campaigners fear its passage would allow religious authorities to introduce new rules through their establishment of the Personal Status code

The draft requires Shia and Sunni endowments to submit a "code of legal rulings" to parliament six months after ratifying the amendments, stipulating the Shia code would be based on Jaafari jurisprudence

"All marriages have to be registered as Sunni or Shia by this amendment. Thus, sectarian division enters all households," said Yanar Mohammed, president of the Organisation of Women's Freedom in Iraq, another group within Coalition 188