From the 1970s to the 1980s, family issues, especially the so-called women's issue, came to the forefront of the political struggle in the Muslim East. Proponents of an" Islamic state "and a return to the fundamental values of Islam claim an" Islamic " solution to this problem. The well-known legal scholar Abdullahi al-Naim emphasized that family law is a kind of launching pad for Islamist groups: once they settle on it, they intend to establish "total control over the state and its institutions" [An-Naim Abdullahi, 2002, p. 18]. The confrontation between militant Islamists, on the one hand, and forces calling for accelerated modernization of the economy and societies, on the other, is characterized both by the growing activity of women and women's organizations everywhere, and by a very acute reaction of various forces and strata of Muslim society to the actions of the state in the field of family law and legislation. All this has good reasons and reasons.
To begin with, the traditional Islamic attitude to the family is based on sacred sources-the Koran and the Sunnah. To invade the sphere of Sharia regulation of family relations means to encroach on the foundations sanctified by centuries-old tradition, secured by Sharia legal proceedings, and zealously supported by the class of Muslim clerics. It is not without reason that family law continued to be a "bastion of Sharia law" against the background of the rapid modernization of civil, especially commercial, and criminal law, which, although unevenly, but steadily covered different countries of the East from the second half of the XIX century.
At the same time, the need for a renovation reorganization of the family institution was objectively dictated by the imperatives of overcoming backwardness in the development of the modern economy and the formation of an appropriate socio-cultural infrastructure. From the end of the 19th century to the beginning of the 20th century, the problem of such renewal has always been in the center of attention of the progressive public in many countries. Her decision was closely linked to the "liberation of women", more precisely, with the elimination of the belittled position of a Muslim woman in the family and society.
As the voices for a new approach to the Muslim family multiplied and gained strength, a certain clarity was brought to the public consciousness regarding the vector and essence of the necessary changes in the field of family law. Nevertheless, only the state was able to launch an effective attack on the position of Sharia law in this area: using the power of the administrative resource with varying degrees of efficiency, it was able to form a body of legislative acts on family issues and the status of women.
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NEW APPROACHES TO FAMILY LAW
The first steps towards the formation of family legislation in the Muslim East were taken even before the collapse of the colonial system that came after the Second World War. In the few countries that associated the fate of a still preserved or newly conquered sovereign state with the modernization of social foundations, the formation of this legislation began to see the prospect of forming a new type of family, that is, a family that could become the foundation of the future civil society.
The Turkish, Afghan, and Egyptian experiences are particularly notable against the background of the initial approaches to family law reform. The fact that in the mid-1920s Republican Turkey was the first in the entire Muslim East to reach the level of secular regulation of the family institution, a certain role was played by the factor of historical continuity. The Republicans led by Mustafa Kemal (Ataturk) had predecessors in moving away from the Sharia regulation of family relations. We are talking about the fact that even under the Young Turk regime in the Ottoman Empire, the Law on Family Rights (1917) was adopted. The furor caused by this act in the empire and beyond was predetermined by direct deviations from sharia law in raising the minimum age for marriage (for girls it came at 17 years, for boys - at the age of 18); providing a Muslim woman with the opportunity to specify in the marriage contract that the husband will not take a new wife, and in addition-the right to file for divorce if the husband violates this contractual obligation [Anderson, 1976, p.49-50].
The Kemalist offensive against the monopoly of sharia law in the field of family law began with the law on the elimination of Sharia courts (1924). Then the Civil Code came into force (1926). Developed on the Swiss model, it diverged from the traditional Islamic attitude towards the belittled position of women in the family: polygamy was abolished, a woman was equal in rights with a man in cases concerning the choice of a spouse (including a different faith), divorce, and inheritance. For the rest of the Muslim world, it was of great importance that the Code gave consistency to the legislative process of moving away from Sharia prescriptions on family issues, defining the mandatory state registration of civil status acts as a system-forming normative principle. Providing the state with the ability to control compliance with the current family legislation, this action was a kind of tool for preventing, if not blocking, offenses. According to the Code, early marriages were outlawed. At the same time, the scope of intervention of relatives in the process of family formation was determined. The lower age limit for marriage was set at 17 for men and 15 for women (in extraordinary cases, 15 and 14 years, respectively). Adult citizens (over the age of 18) They could marry on their own, and underage couples required written permission to marry from older family members.
However, the Civil Code has adopted a Shari'ah injunction to separate the spouses ' ownership of property that each of them possessed before marriage or acquired after marriage, and also that in the case of any transactions with their property, the wife must obtain the consent of the husband. A married woman was recognized by the Code as "partially incapacitated": only the husband had the right to represent the family, and the wife-only in an exceptional case, when there is a long-term need for it; the husband was recognized as the head of the family, while the wife-the creator of the house; to enter any paid work, she needed her husband's permission, etc. According to the authoritative conclusion of N. Y. Ulchenko, the Code "fixed a number of legal advantages of men", but their source should be considered not so much the residual influence of IP-
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Lama noted the limited interpretation of women's rights, including in the European countries themselves in the first decades of the XX century "[Ulchenko, 2001, p. 329].
Afghanistan of the late XIX century - 20s of the XX century. It was an example of the rapid development of reforms designed to improve the position of women in the family and in society, and their no less rapid curtailment under pressure from the opposition, led by Muslim clergy and tribal leaders. The fate of the reforms was largely determined by the fact that they were carried out "from above" - at the will of the ruling monarchs, with the support of a small stratum of young Afghans from among the representatives of the educated younger generation. Reformers were fond of the tactics of "preemptive action", which excluded the gradual preparation of the Muslim masses for very radical and dynamic transformations.
The first official actions were justified, however, by reference to Islam: the custom of a widow being obliged to marry the next of kin of her deceased husband was declared and outlawed as contrary to it. The tradition of spending heavily on kalym and wedding celebrations was also officially condemned.
Subsequent innovations at first largely followed the example of the Young Turks, and then the Kemalists. But it was overlooked that the Afghan situation was distinguished from the Turkish one by the greater stability of the traditional patriarchal foundations and the stereotypes of the mass worldview that go back to them, including the religious and dogmatic rejection of innovations (bid) as forbidden and sinful. It was under this assessment that opponents of the reforms summed up a series of legislative acts: on mandatory state registration of marriage; on the right of an adult girl to terminate the marriage ties with which she was bound before reaching adulthood; on the right of a woman to divorce because of her husband's ill-treatment or lack of proper material support; on the abolition of slavery, according to which the owners of concubine slaves were obliged to either let them go free, or take some of them officially as wives; on the prohibition of forced marriages and marriages between minors.
Reformers ' attempts to break the traditionalist mood of the masses by personal example (first of all, dissolving their own harems) only inflamed the anger of the opposition and intensified their struggle for power. The year 1928 was simultaneously marked by the launch of an official campaign against the wearing of the veil (Soraya, the Khan's wife, was the first to throw it off, and 100 women soon followed her example) and the fact that under the pressure of the traditionalist opposition, the last of the reformist monarchs was forced to leave the throne and the country [see: Korgun, 2004, pp. 105-111].
In the status of an independent kingdom, Egypt was a direct evidence of how dependent the course of changes in the legal regulation of the family is on pressure from "below", especially on the activity of women's organizations. In 1923, responding to a petition filed by the Egyptian Women's Union, the Parliament passed a law on the minimum age for marriage (16 years for girls and 18 years for boys).
In 1929, the law on personal status came into force, according to which talaq (divorce based on Sharia norms) was no longer the final stage of divorce initiated by the husband. A judicial procedure for divorce was introduced, after which the ex-husband was obliged to pay alimony to the divorced spouse. In the event of a divorce, the son could stay with the mother until the age of 7, and the daughter - until the age of 9; when they reached this age, they had to go to the father's house. It is noteworthy that the law was based on a bill approved two years earlier by the Cabinet of Ministers, but then rejected by King Fu ad [An-Naim Abdullahi, 2002, p. 171].
Individual reform initiatives in the field of family law have not lost their legal force for a long time: The Family Rights Act (1917), which was passed under the-
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nat was still active in the Ottoman Empire and continued to operate after its collapse, for example, in some former imperial territories: in Jordan, with few changes until 1951.", in Syria-until 1953 ."
FAMILY LAW: DEVELOPMENT TRENDS
Events related to the collapse of the colonial system and the formation of young states on the site of former colonies and semi-colonies opened a new stage in the development of family law, including during the corresponding restructuring of the judicial system in the Muslim East. Of particular importance was the fact that these States were included in the global system of foreign policy and foreign economic relations in the status of one of the subjects of international law. Thus, the regulatory and legal solution of family problems, as well as the women's issue, opened up the prospect of moving from the level of domestic initiatives to the level of interstate cooperation, both regional and international.
A truly historic event was the participation of countries with a professing Islamic population in the preparation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) under the auspices of the United Nations. The main provisions of the Universal Declaration, including the principle of civil equality of men and women (Article 40), were subsequently reflected in the constitutions of most states of the Muslim East. The gradual loss of a purely declarative nature by this principle was objectively pushed by the implementation of the state course on "catching up development" with its prospect of a radical renewal of society on a civil-legal basis, with its initial independence from the system of traditional Islamic social status gradations.
In most countries, the official departure from this system was often carried out in such a way that innovations were more or less tightly wrapped in expressions of loyalty to the values that are generally valid for Muslims. In the Constitution of the Republic of Egypt (1956), for example, Islam was declared the state religion (Article 2), the family was declared the foundation of society, and its foundations were "religion, traditions and patriotism" (Article 5). The state was obliged to guarantee support for the family, protect motherhood and infancy (Article 18), and make it easier for a woman to combine social work with family responsibilities (Article 19). In an expanded form, these guarantees and obligations were reproduced in the 1971 Constitution. After the introduction of a clause in the text in 1980 stating that "the basis of legislation is the provisions of Muslim law-Sharia" (Article 2), a new article appeared. It read: "The State provides women with the opportunity to combine social work with family responsibilities and gives them equal rights with men in the socio-political, cultural and economic spheres of life in accordance with the norms of Islamic Sharia law" (Article 11).
The direction in which the family legislation of the Muslim East developed in the second half of the XX - beginning of the XXI century was determined by the fact that the inertia of the traditional patriarchal regulation of the family with its focus on having many children, on the reproduction of a rigid intra-family hierarchy of subordination hindered and complicated economic growth due to its non-compliance with the requirements of the general state of the human factor. Rapid rates of uncontrolled population growth were becoming a real disaster in countries where the majority of the population already lived below the poverty line. As a result of demographic disadvantage, the already modest achievements in the economy were objectively negated, social tensions grew due to agricultural overpopulation, over-urbanization, unemployment, the growth of the lumpenized stratum at the expense of those who could not and cannot find a place in modern life, etc.
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Notable milestones on the way to modernizing the legal regulation of the family institution in the Muslim East were: the Egyptian Civil Code (1948), the Family Rights Act (Jordan, 1951), the Personal Status Act (Syria, 1953), the Personal Status Code (Tunis, 1956), the Personal Status Code (Morocco, 1958), the Personal Status Act (Iraq, 1959, amended in 1963), the Marriage Decree (Algeria, 1959), the Family Protection Act (Iran, 1967, reissued in revised form in 1975), the Marriage Act (Indonesia, 1971), Women's Rights in the Event of Marriage or Divorce (Libya, 1972), Marriage and Divorce Registration Act (Bangladesh, 1974), Polygamy Restriction Act (South Yemen, 1974), Marriage and Divorce Act (Malaysia, 1976).
Although in the late 1970s and early 1980s, some countries (primarily in Iran and Pakistan) experienced a failure in their previous legislative activity to update family law, most other states did not leave the highway of its modernization. Entered into force: Bangladesh - Decree on Family Courts (1985), Egypt - Law on Amendments to the Personal Status Act (1985), Personal Status Act (2000); Kuwait-Personal Status Code (1984); Libya-Family Law (1984). Among the countries where Muslims were a religious minority, India was particularly active in family legislation, with the adoption of the Family Courts Act (1984) and the Protection of Women's Rights in Divorce Act (1986).
In the 80-90s of the XX century. The adoption of normative legal acts designed to protect the honor, dignity of a woman, and her personal inviolability has become a special area of legislation. Two laws were published successively in Bangladesh: the Suppression of Violence against Women Act (1983), and the Repression of Women and Children Act (2000). In Morocco, the Honour Crimes Act (1993) entered into force, which imposed prison sentences on husbands, male relatives who followed their parents ' sexual orientation. the old custom of arbitrary reprisals, that is, murders, due to the loss of a girl's virginity or the adultery of her wife. The new Turkish Criminal Code (2004) provides, first, for life imprisonment for persons whose assault on women's lives is motivated by "tradition and customs"; second, judicial investigation and prosecution of sexual violence in the family if the victim submits a claim to the court.
As a rule, the modernization of the legal regulation of family-marriage and family-kinship relations began with the introduction of state registration of marriage. Since the mid-20th century, the binding nature of this act has been fixed in laws adopted in Algeria, Bangladesh, Egypt, Indonesia, Jordan, Iraq, Iran, Libya, Morocco, Pakistan, Syria, and Tunisia. Similar actions were also carried out against the local Muslim minority by the authorities of Singapore, the Philippines, and Sri Lanka.
The general trend was that marriage was officially recognized as legal only when it was registered by the State. In principle, this helped to improve the situation of married women, since the state recorded "the legal grounds for the wife's rights in the case of divorce proceedings, disputes regarding the custody of children after divorce, as well as in inheritance" [White, 1978, p.56].
However, not everywhere and not all Muslims (primarily from remote, remote areas) practiced state registration of marriage, considering that the Sharia procedure of marriage is sufficient to certify its legality. The case of Turkey is illustrative: in 1950 (i.e., 24 years after the entry into force of the provision on state registration of marriage), the authorities were forced to grant the status of legally born 8 million children (with a total population of 21 million people), whose parents were limited to marrying according to Sharia rules. After all, only such
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the status directly related to birth in a state-registered marriage gave the right to the inheritance left by the parents [Ahmad Leila, 1984, p. 116].
The initial significance of state registration of marriage was and still is enhanced by the fact that this act requires documenting compliance with a number of provisions of family law. First of all, this applies to the norms designed to stop the practice of early (child) marriages permitted by Sharia law by raising the lower threshold of the marriage age. By the beginning of the twenty-first century, Algeria and Bangladesh had legally set the minimum age of marriage at 21 for men and 18 for women; Morocco at 18 and 15, respectively; Tunisia at 20 for men and 17 for women; Kuwait at 17 and 15 years; in Indonesia-19 years for men and 16 years for women; in Egypt and Malaysia - 18 and 16 years, respectively; in Libya-20 years for men and women; in Iraq - 18 years for men and women; in Lebanon-18 years for men and for women at 17 years of age, if they are Sunni, and if they are Shiites, then for men at 15, and for women at 9 years of age [An-Naim Abdullahi, p. 112,124, 127, 165,171, 176, 179,182, 218, 265,270].
The increase in the lower threshold of the marriageable age was usually followed by innovations concerning the role of men-older paternal relatives - in creating a young family, especially when marrying girls. These relatives continued to be the confidants of those who, due to extraordinary circumstances, marry before reaching the age of majority. In Indonesia (since 1974), in this case, both parents or one of them together with a trustee can give a marriage license. Only in Tunisia (since 1993) can a mother, as well as a father, give a similar permission. In Brunei, a marriage is recognized as legal not only when it is registered by the State, which is carried out by the cadi, but also with the consent of the trustees of the bride and groom. In Indonesia, the consent of both is only required for those under the age of 21.
A marriage license from a guardian (wali) is required for a woman of any age in Jordan if she is getting married for the first time. If the Wali refuses, the Sharia judge (qadi) has the right to determine whether there are legitimate grounds for doing so. In their absence, the judge has the right to grant permission for marriage. In Egypt, a judge has a similar right and uses it if the wali opposes a girl's marriage on grounds of class status, disputes over dowry, etc.In Morocco, a woman must have a lawyer when entering into a marriage contract, and she can choose one herself. The judge who certifies the contract should make sure that the marriage will contribute to the moral well-being of the future spouse. In Kuwait and Algeria, an adult woman does not need the consent of a guardian to marry, but he represents her when entering into a prenuptial agreement [An-Naim Abdullah, p. 112, 118, 120, 124, 140, 171, 176, 218; Coulson, Hinchcliffe, 1978, p. 39].
Polygamy has been outlawed only in Turkey (since 1926) and Tunisia (since 1956) [for more information: Voronchanina, 1978, pp. 71-80; Syukiyainen, 1086, pp. 159-181] and is practically not allowed in Morocco (due to doubts about the ability of a man to treat everyone absolutely "fairly"). his wives, as prescribed by the Qur'an). According to the new Turkish Criminal Code (2004), polygamists, persons who have entered into a fictitious marriage or have limited themselves to religious marriage procedures face prison sentences.
In most countries of the Muslim East, the situation is such that polygamy is not prohibited in principle, but is placed in one or another restrictive framework. In Syria and Iraq, for example, polygamous marriages require prior approval from a judge. And it is given if there is evidence that the husband has a "legitimate interest" for this (for example, the desire to have children,
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while the first spouse is infertile), as well as legitimate sources of income sufficient to have more than one wife. Failure to comply with this requirement in Iraq will result in a prison sentence. In Jordan, polygamy is allowed, but polygamous marriages are subject to a significantly higher tax rate than monogamous marriages. According to Libyan, Algerian, Egyptian, and Moroccan legislation, polygamy is partially constrained by the fact that on the eve of entering into another marriage, the spouse is obliged to notify the existing wife (or wives) about it. In Libya, Algeria and Morocco, the wife's consent to her husband's subsequent marriage is mandatory, and if she does not agree, the woman gets the right to divorce. In Egypt, a similar right is granted to the wife (s) of a previous marriage after one year, if she proves in court that the polygamous union of the spouse causes her moral damage, that she is deprived of proper material support. In Bangladesh and Indonesia, polygamous marriage is subject to mandatory registration in a court whose decision is based on a preliminary understanding of the compliance of the marriage contract with the requirements of the family law in force in the country [An-Naim Adullahi, p. 112, 120, 160, 166, 180, 262, 263].
Restrictions on polygamy are usually accompanied by a set of legal acts related to talaq; material support for a divorced wife by her former spouse; and finally, the rights of parents who are divorced, parents in relation to their minor children. By the end of the 20th century, most countries were practicing various ways to restrict divorce based on talaq. Everywhere it was not recognized as legally significant if it came from the husband when he was in a state of drug or alcohol intoxication, lack of sleep, malaise, etc.The main thing is that the requirement for official registration of a divorce was included in the norm.
In Brunei, no more than seven days after the talaq formula is pronounced, the husband must register a divorce with the cadi, and the cadi can oblige the husband to support the divorced wife financially in accordance with the status that she had before marriage. In Egypt, a talaq divorce must be written and notarized. The notary must hand over a copy of this document to his wife within 30 days. A divorce initiated by the husband without any grounds and without the consent of the wife, gives her the right to receive from the former spouse an amount sufficient for at least two years of residence. Its size can be increased if the husband's financial resources allow, if the marriage was long enough, etc. The son is entrusted to the care of a divorced mother until he reaches the age of 10, the daughter-up to 15 years. A judge considering a divorce case may extend this period for a son to 15 years in the interests of the children, and for a daughter - until her marriage. In Morocco, a talaq divorce is officially registered in the presence of two male witnesses. Since 1993, the presence of the wife is also required. By a court decision, the husband is obligated to pay the divorced spouse monetary compensation for talaq. The son remains with the mother until the age of majority, and the daughter-until marriage. Compensation for talaq (in the amount of one year's financial support) is also due to a divorced woman in Jordan. In Tunisia, a thrice-divorced man is prohibited from remarrying, and talaq in its classical form is not legally binding. In Malaysia, divorce must be done through the courts, so the practice of talaq is punishable, whether by a fine or imprisonment. When deciding on the amount of monetary support due to a divorced woman from her ex-husband, the judge takes into account her work in the household, her contribution to the family welfare. Sons are in the care of a divorced mother up to 7 years, daughters - up to 9 years [An-Naim Abdullahi, p. 113, 121, 124, 128,131, 144, 172,183, 262, 271].
Not without strong traditionalist opposition in some Eastern countries, the right to divorce also began to be assigned to women. This is an innovation
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It was justified both from a purely humanitarian and moral point of view, and with the help of a reference to the Sharia precept regarding "blasphemy". In the first case, the possibility of filing a divorce claim depends on certain circumstances: the husband's failure to pay the salary due to the wife under the marriage contract; the husband's three-year prison sentence; his two-year absence without legal grounds; impotence, a serious illness of the husband that can damage the wife's health, etc. In the second case, the wife is allowed to leave her husband on the basis of "mu'awad" (i.e., in accordance with the Sharia principle of "exchange of rights and property"), when the wife has the right to leave the spouse, returning him mahr (qalim).
According to the Egyptian Personal Status Procedure Law (2000), the "hulu" procedure can be the first and final stage of the divorce process, if the divorcing couple agrees to limit it. The second stage occurs a month later, if the husband insists on continuing the marriage. Then the wife gets the right to a divorce suit, and the court can decide in her favor, provided that the mahr is refused. When proceeding with a divorce case initiated by either party, the judge must at least twice suggest that the spouses reconcile. One attempt at reconciliation must be separated from the other by a time interval of not less than one and not more than two months from the date of filing a claim for divorce. A judge is required to be particularly diligent in his efforts to preserve the family when a divorcing couple has children [Law No. I..., 2000, p. 14-15].
The failure to modernize family law in those countries where the policy of establishing sharia as the basis of legislation was officially proclaimed in the late 1970s and 1980s had the peculiarity that the deviation from the previous positions was initially not total and unambiguous. Thus, the importance of the constitutional principle behind the declaration of civil equality of men and women was preserved everywhere. According to the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran (Article 20), their humanitarian, political, economic, and social rights based on the precepts of Islam are equally protected by law. It was emphasized that everyone has the freedom to choose their occupation, provided that this is not contrary to Islam, the public interest and the rights of others (article 28).
The main thing is that the official recognition of sharia law as the basis of state legislation in Iran, Pakistan, and a number of other countries actually interrupted the process of updating family law there only for a while.
In the Islamic Republic of Iran, for example, the curtailment of previous achievements in family law lasted just over a decade. The first signal of a rollback to Sharia law was, as is well known, Ayatollah Khomeini's order (1979) to dress all women (including foreign women) in the hijab. This was followed by the elimination of family courts, so that divorce, inheritance, and Waqf cases were handled by civil law courts. The Shiite provision on temporary marriage, as well as the Sharia provision on polygamy (1980), began to enter into full force. The minimum marriage age for girls was first lowered from 18 to 13 years, then to 9 years. The wife was allowed to leave the walls of the house only with the permission of her husband, her departure abroad was possible only with the written permission of her husband. The testimony of two women in court was again equated with that of one man. The imbalance of women's and men's rights is also reflected in the criminal legislation of the Islamic Republic of Iran: under the Law on Retribution (1982).) for the intentional murder of a woman, the man had to pay half of the amount that was due for the murder of a man, but if the woman intentionally killed a man, then she was subject to death.
Since the beginning of the 1990s, there has been a tendency in Iran to deviate from a number of Khomeini regime regulations in the field of family law. According to an amendment made to the Civil Code in 1992, the procedure for divorce was changed. A man could no longer confine himself to talaq in the presence of two male witnesses, since for an officer, it was necessary to have a drink.-
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an appropriate court decision was required to register the divorce in full. A married woman was given the opportunity to terminate the marriage not only on the principle of "blasphemy", but also because of the lack of material support from the spouse, regardless of the reason; "bad behavior and stay of the husband in bad company"; insanity of the spouse; his six-month unknown absence from the house without legal grounds; the husband's entry into a new marriage without legal grounds. prior consent of the wife (s). A divorced woman received the right to half of the spouse's property in the event that the court was satisfied that the initiator of the divorce was the husband, but the wife's behavior did not give any reason for the dissolution of the marriage. In all other circumstances, the husband must financially support the ex-wife for at least three months, and in addition, pay for her work in maintaining the family household. Although the traditional Islamic rule remained in force, according to which a son could remain in the care of a divorced mother for two years, and a daughter for up to seven years, a new rule was introduced: by a court decision, these terms can be extended if the father is limited in the ability to raise his children with dignity [An-Naim Abdullahi, p. 109 - 110]. In order to prevent cases of forced marriage of girls as much as possible, the Parliament approved an amendment to the Civil Code, according to which the issue of marriage of girls under the age of 15 was to be decided in court. Nevertheless, for the first marriage in her life, a woman had to have the permission of her father or paternal grandfather [Dunaeva, 2005, p. 285].
Thus, the transition through periods of activation, as well as decline in the legislative activity of most states of the Muslim East in the field of Muslim law, ultimately contributed not only to the modernization of this sphere, but also to the gradual secularization of the entire legal system. This process began with the self-assertion of the state as the supreme rule-making authority and was embodied in the formation of the corpus of family legislation. Its first components were separate deviations from historically obsolete Sharia prescriptions. As these deviations multiplied and became systemic, the legal regulation of the family reached a qualitatively new level, eventually reaching the secular standards of modern requirements.
INTERNATIONAL LEGAL ASPECTS OF FAMILY LAW
The 60s-80s of the XX century were marked by the fact that many countries of the Muslim East began to engage in the process of correlating domestic family legislation with international legal acts, including on the rights of women and the rights of the child. This process expanded as international standards for these rights were developed under the auspices of the UN, and the international mechanism for their protection was formed and improved.
The Muslim East did not take a unified position on the fundamental international legal acts on the family and the status of women. Relatively few countries have ignored these acts in whole or in part. Other States have either acceded to or ratified certain UN Conventions. In most cases, there were statements and reservations about the unacceptability of certain provisions due to local socio-cultural specifics regarding family relations and the position of women in the family.
According to the authoritative opinion of the prominent Russian legal scholar L. R. Syukiyainen, there is a certain amount of truth in all this. There is, in particular, a direct connection between the peculiarities of the modern Islamic view of women's rights and the system of values, the origins of which go back to the Muslim legal culture. According to the latter, the focus is not on the comprehensive equalization of women's rights with men.
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a man, but equal opportunities for them to exercise their rights, which bear the stamp of differences in family responsibilities. The fulfillment of a woman's family duty, respectively, has a higher value than the realization of professional and other ambitions [Shukiyainen, 2002, pp. 303-304]. In itself, this circumstance leads to a conflict between the norms of international law on family issues and the relevant legal practice of the States of the Muslim East. The complex situation became fully apparent after the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (1979) was adopted under the auspices of the United Nations, where the category of discriminatory acts included "any distinction, exclusion or restriction on the basis of sex that is aimed at weakening or nullifying the recognition or implementation of the Convention". women, regardless of their marital status, gender equality, human rights and fundamental freedoms in political, economic, social, cultural, civil or any other field."
By the beginning of the XXI century. The Convention was virtually ignored by such countries of the Muslim East as Bahrain, Brunei, Iran, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, the United Arab Emirates, and Oman. The number of States that ratified this international legal act was also small. Among them - Egypt (1981), Indonesia (1984), Tunisia (1989), Jordan (1992). The majority of countries have joined the Convention: Bangladesh (1984), Iraq (1986), Libya (1989), Morocco (1993), Kuwait (1994), Malaysia (1995), Pakistan (1996), Algeria (1996), Lebanon (1997).
Both in cases of ratification and in cases of accession to the Convention, individual States have made unilateral declarations stating their intention not to enact or modify certain provisions of this act. Egypt has singled out, for example, the principle of equality of mother and father in determining the citizenship of children (Article 9, paragraph 2), and the principle of equality of men and women in family and marriage relations (Article 16) as unacceptable due to their discrepancy with Sharia law. Morocco and Jordan have made similar reservations, adding to their rejection of the provision on marital equality in the choice of place of residence (art. 15, para.4). Pakistan has stipulated its accession to the Convention on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women with the intention to comply with norms that do not conflict with its Constitution. Tunisia made a similar statement, adding that it does not accept a number of provisions (including the equalization of spouses in the right to give their last name to a child), since they "are in conflict with the Personal Status Code" [see An-Naim Abdullahi, p. 122, 125, 129, 173, 177, 181, 184,219,237,267,272].
The reaction of the countries of the Muslim East to another UN act, the 1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child, was generally quite positive. However, only Libya (1989), Bahrain (1992), Yemen (1991), and Lebanon (1991) registered their unconditional accession to the Convention. Most States accompanied their accession to the Convention on the Rights of the Child or its ratification with various reservations and declarations. Iraq (1994), Oman (1996), Saudi Arabia (1996), the United Arab Emirates (1997), and the United Arab Emirates (1997) have referred to the fact that certain provisions of this Act contradict Sharia and Islamic laws. A similar reservation accompanied the ratification of the Convention by Egypt (1990), Pakistan (1990), Bangladesh (1990), Kuwait (1991), Jordan (1992), Algeria (1993), Syria (1993), Morocco (1993), Iran (1994), Brunei (1995), Qatar (1995). their main objection was the statement of the child's right to change his religion. Only three States (Malaysia, which acceded to the Convention in 1995, Indonesia and Tunisia, which ratified it in 1990 and 1992, respectively). They explained that a number of provisions of this act were unacceptable to them by saying that they did not comply with the country's Constitution. The reservations made by Indonesia concerned primarily freedom of expression
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freedom of conscience and religion, and the right to receive information [An-Naim Abdullahi, p. 110 - 111, 115,125, 129, 131,147, 167, 177,219, 237, 263,267, 272].
Nevertheless, the fact remains that the Muslim East is increasingly being drawn into the global process of normative regulation of human rights in all its aspects, including the rights of men, women, and children. And this opens up new prospects not only for the qualitative improvement of the family legislation of individual countries. According to S. V. Polenina, a prominent Russian legal scholar, the process of "transferring the problem of human rights in general and women's rights, including from a purely national level to the level of international law"is extremely important. And here the matter is not limited to "recognizing an individual, regardless of gender, as a subject of international law with all the rights, obligations and opportunities that follow from this" [Polenina, 2000, p.6].
Ultimately, the path of the Muslim East to the democratic reconstruction of society and the state runs through the renewal of the organization of the family, based on the balance of international legal norms and institutions that are generally valid for all mankind, marked by the seal of civilizational and cultural specifics.
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Polenina S. V. Women's Rights in the system of human Rights: International and National Aspects, Moscow: Institute of State and Law of the Russian Academy of Sciences, 2000.
Syukiyainen L. R. Moslemskoe pravo [Muslim Law]. Questions of theory and practice, Moscow: Nauka Publ., 1986.
Syukiyainen L. R. Islamic concept of human rights // Human rights. Results of the century, trends, prospects, Moscow, 2002.
Ulchenko N. Y. Islamicheskaya traditsiya, fem'inizm i polozhenie zhenshchiny v sovremennoi Turkii [Islamic tradition, feminism and the position of women in modern Turkey].
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White E. H. Legal Reform as an Indicator of Women's Status in Muslim Nations // Women in the Muslim World. Cambridge (Mass.) - London: Harvard University Press, 1978
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