Afghan women demonstrate over controversial law

By Emma Graham-Harrison

KABUL (Reuters) - Afghan women staged rival demonstrations on Wednesday for and against a new family law, which opponents denounce as a step back towards the oppressiveness of the Taliban era but supporters say defends Islamic justice.

Separated by human chains of female police, and watched by wary riot control officers, the two groups lined up outside a new Kabul Shi'ite mosque built by a powerful cleric who helped draft the contested law.

The legislation -- which applies to the Shi'ite minority that makes up about 10 percent of Afghanistan's population -- has drawn widespread condemnation from Western countries, many of whom have troops fighting to support Afghanistan's government.

Critics say the law would restrict women's freedom of movement, and that some articles could be interpreted as legalising marital rape. Backers say it would give the long-oppressed Shi'ites their own family law code for the first time, and that critics have misread parts of the law.

"We don't want the Taliban law," read one banner waved by the group of around 50 women opposing the law. They handed out a declaration calling the legislation an insult to their dignity.

"It is frightening to be here but I could not just sit in my house," said Halima Hosseini, a 27-year-old at her first protest.

"I personally cannot allow someone else to represent me and put articles in law that are against my rights, against human rights and consider me, as a woman, a second-class human."

But the law's opponents were outnumbered by its supporters. More than 100 women marched out from the mosque shouting "God is Great" and waving banners backing "Islamic Justice".