LilVictims

On December 22, 2023, Zambia enacted an amendment (amendment act) to the 1918 Marriage Act that raised the minimum marriageable age to 18 for all marriages, including those concluded under customary law. The amendment act adopts the Zambian Constitution’s definition of the term “child” as “a person who has attained, or is below, the age … Continue reading “Zambia: Amendment to Marriage Act Enacted, Child Marriage Outlawed”

A database of teachers who lost their license for committing obscene acts against children began operating in Japan on April 1, 2023. The Act on the Prevention of Sexual Violence by Educational Personnel (Act No. 57 of 2021), which took effect on April 1, 2022, obligated the national government to establish the new database. (Act … Continue reading “Japan: Database of Teachers Who Committed Obscene Acts against Children Begins Operating”

The Marriage and Civil Partnership (Minimum Age) Act 2022, which received royal assent on April 28, 2022, entered into force in England and Wales on February 27, 2023. The act, which was a private member’s bill that received widespread cross-party support, amends the Marriage Act 1949 and increases the minimum age to marry in England … Continue reading “England and Wales: Legal Age for Marriage Raised from 16 to 18”

On August 24, 2022, Zambia’s president, Hakainde Hichilema, signed into law a comprehensive law governing children, the Children’s Code Act (Act No. 12) of 2022. The act, which includes 19 parts and 198 provisions, provides for a comprehensive legal framework to govern matters affecting children for the first time in the country’s history. It brought … Continue reading “Zambia: Children’s Code Act Enacted”

On September 4, 2022, the Security Directorate of Tobruk, a city on Libya’s eastern Mediterranean coast, announced that it had detained 287 undocumented Egyptian migrants who had illegally crossed the Egyptian-Libyan border. The migrants, many of them children as young as 12 years old, had been locked in a warehouse in the suburbs of Tobruk … Continue reading “Libya: Immigration Authorities Detain Egyptian Minors Smuggled into the Country”