Karzai blinks on controvesial law

News today out of Afghanistan is that President Hamid Karzai has promised to amend a new law that prompted an international outcry over what it contained. Critics blasted Karzai over the 'Shia Family Law' he signed last month saying that, among other things, it legalized spousal rape and child marriage.

Now, after weeks of international outrage that included government officials in Europe and pundits in Canada asking why they were supporting his government in the first place if this was the kind of 'change' he was bringing to Afghanistan, Karzai announced that he would amend the law to take out the Taliban-style provisions regarding women. Hopefully though Karzai will actually take the time to read the amendments before signing them - one excuse given for the Shia Family Law in the first place was that Karzai signed it without actually reading it so he simply didn't know about all of its horrible details.

Karzai is now promising that a new Family Law will respect the Afghan constitution, which itself has provisions to protect gender and human rights - all of which the Family Law violated.

We'll see what take two of the Family Law includes, and whether Afghanistan's hard line clerics, who were big backers of the original Shia Family Law and its anti-women provisions, will accept a new version.