一夫多妻在法国

WHEN police stopped a woman driving with a full face-covering Islamic veil, little did they know what they would uncover. It turned out that her husband, a halal butcher, practised polygamy, which is illegal in France—or, rather, he was living with four women, one of whom he was married to. Brice Hortefeux, the interior minister, wildly overreacted, demanding that he be stripped of his French nationality. The affair has exposed both the reality of polygamy and the difficulty of doing anything about it.
当警察叫停一个头裹伊斯兰面纱的驾车妇女时，他们并不知道接下来将有什么发现。原来这个妇女的丈夫，一个按回教教义执业的屠夫，实行着在法国被认为非法的一夫多妻制，或者说，他正和四个女人生活在一起，其中一个与他结了婚。法国内政部长Brice Hortefeux先生显然是反应过激了，他要求剥夺该男子的法国国籍。这件事揭露了在法国一夫多妻制的现实状况和对此作出任何改变的艰难。

France considers polygamy “a grave infringement of the principle of equality between men and women”. The practice was forbidden in 1993, when immigration laws were tightened to stop husbands bringing extra wives into the country. Yet there are an estimated 200,000 people, including children, living in 16,000-20,000 polygamous families in France. Most are of African origin, particularly from Muslim parts of the Maghreb and Sahel, where polygamy is accepted.
法国认为一夫多妻制是“对男女平等原则的严重违反”。在1993年，一夫多妻制遭到禁止，那时正是为了避免男人们偕非正妻外的伴侣而收紧入境移民政策之时。然而据估计，现在在法国有200,000人，包括儿童，生活在16,000至20,000一夫多妻制的家庭中。他们大多数为非洲裔，尤其是来自允许一夫多妻制的马格里布地区（非洲北部地区）和萨赫勒地区（非洲中北部地区）的人。

Over the years, notes Sonia Imloul in a study for the Institut Montaigne, a think-tank, the authorities have turned a blind eye to what she calls life “like a prison for the wives”, many of them forced into marriage. Polygamy is widely blamed for social ills ranging from school absenteeism to street violence. Politicians say it is exploited to maximise welfare and housing benefits. Such fraud is hard to detect, since polygamists “marry” various wives under Islam, all of them claiming single-parent payments, while officially being married to just one.
Sonia Imloul女士在为智库机构Institut Montaigne进行的研究中称，多年以来，很多妇女都被迫结婚，而当局对她所称的“对妻子们而言简直如同监狱一般”的生活视而不见。一夫多妻制因其引发诸如从辍学到街头暴力等一系列社会痼疾而广受诟病。政客们称这是为了诈取大额福利和住房补贴所进行的诈骗行为。此类诈骗难以察觉，因为一夫多妻者在伊斯兰教义的掩护下“娶”几个夫人，但只登记一个合法妻子，而这些女子都声称自己是单身妈妈。

In a comic twist, Lies Hebbadj, the husband who came under attack from Mr Hortefeux, tried to turn his case against his accusers by declaring that “if one is stripped of French nationality because one has mistresses, then many Frenchmen could be.” The French official organisation representing Muslims this week denounced Mr Hebbadj’s comments as “offensive and insulting” to Islam, stressing that it recognises only official marriages. Even so Eric Besson, the immigration minister, concedes that there are unlikely to be any grounds for stripping Mr Hebbadj of his French nationality without changing the law.更多信息请访问：http://www.24en.com/
富有戏剧性的是，受到内政部长Brice Hortefeux先生指控的Lies Hebbadj先生试图先发制人，他声称“如果一个人因为有情妇就被剥夺法国国籍，那么很多法国人都法网难逃”。法国官方伊斯兰教代表机构本周谴责Hebbadj先生的言论是对伊斯兰教的“冒犯和侮辱”，强调说伊斯兰只承认合法的婚姻。尽管如此，移民部长Eric Besson先生坦陈，在现行法律下，要剥夺Hebbadj先生的法国国籍缺乏法律支持。

Women’s-rights lobbies have welcomed this debate. Chantal Brunel, a deputy from Nicolas Sarkozy’s ruling UMP party, and a campaigner against domestic violence, describes wives in polygamous marriages as living in “semi-slavery”, subject to violence, and their daughters to female circumcision. France is keen on classic women’s issues, she observes, such as equal pay and promotion at work, or women on corporate boards (see article), but less interested in the grim reality of polygamy on French soil.
女性权利游说者们对针对此事的争论很是欢迎。尼古拉斯•萨科奇总统领导下的执政党人民运动联盟中一位名叫Chantal Brunel的女性众议员，同时也是一位反对家庭暴力的活动家，声称一夫多妻制婚姻中的女方生活在“半奴隶制”环境中，他们本身是家庭暴力的受害者，而他们的女儿则是女性割礼的受害者。据她观察，法国一直对有关女性的社会问题加以关注，比如女性的工作薪资和提拔，或者女性进入企业董事会的权利等，然而却对法国存在一夫多妻制这一现实问题关注不足。