“The forced marriage unit deals with 250 cases a year.” And that number is certain to climb.
“Girl, 11, rescued from marriage,” from BBC News, with thanks to Darcy:
An 11-year-old girl has been rescued from a forced marriage, the Home Office has said.
Minister Baroness Scotland said the girl, who was born in Britain, was taken to Bangladesh at the age of six to care for her disabled mother.
At 11, she was forced into marriage but her aunt in the UK reported the case to authorities who brought her back to Britain and put her in foster care.
It is one of 5,000 cases handled by the government’s forced marriage unit.
Baroness Scotland told the BBC’s Asian Network: “We’ve just rescued an 11-year-old who’d been forced into marriage, who’d been raped.
“Since she was six she’d been looking after her disabled mother and two siblings. And with the help of her aunt we were able to rescue her and bring her back.”
The forced marriage unit was set up just over two years ago to help victims and survivors of forced marriage.
It deals with 250 cases a year and has rescued 300 people, many of them very young girls.