In April, Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak issued a...

In April, Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak issued a decree ending a controversial law that allows a rapist to walk away free if he marries his victim. Parliament is expected to legislate the repeal of Art. 291- that punishes rape by life imprisonment, or the death penalty if kidnapping is involved, but stops all punishment if the rapist marries his victim.The move was applauded by women's rights activists, who said the law acted as a reward to the rapist and placed pressure on the victim to accept marriage in order to salvage family honor. "A rapist must be punished," said Nadia Abdullah, an activist with the Egyptian Organization for Human Rights (EOHR). "If a woman and her family want to end the issue by marriage it should be their choice. If it is offered to them as an option by the police at a police station that only serves to force them into it." Ms Abdullah said that families agreed to the marriage option because they feared that no other husband could be found. "They would rather their daughter became known as a divorcee than an unmarried woman whose hymen had been ruptured."The Grand Mufti, Sheikh Nasr Farid Wasel, who is Egypt's senior Sunni Muslim cleric, has already said that unmarried rape victims should be permitted to have abortions, and ruled that government clinics should be allowed to perform operations on rape victims to reconstruct their hymens and 'restore' their virginity. His ruling has no legal weight but his views are deeply respected. At present, abortions are only permitted if three doctors testify that the operation is necessary to save the woman's life.