FORCED marriages will be the focus of a conference in Huddersfield tomorrow.
Speakers at the event at Dalton Grange will include a man and woman who have been subjected to a forced marriage, Foreign and Commonwealth Office representative Heather Harvey and a Kirklees imam, plus Kirklees Racial Equality Council officer Khalid Hussein.
The event will look at forced marriages within all cultures. The day has been organised by the Kirklees Domestic Violence Forum and Kirklees Community Safety Partnership.
Kirklees Domestic Violence Forum co-ordinator Thelma Singleton said: "The definition of a forced marriage is one when either one or both of the parties do not wish to marry, as opposed to an arranged marriage, where both parties are willing."
Ms Singleton stressed that such marriages affected men and women from all walks of life and from many cultures.
She added: "The marriages are illegal and a basic infringement of human rights.
"They are mistakenly believed to be an issue which only affects Asian women, but they affect men and women and also differing cultures."
One of the aims of the day is to learn from people who have already encountered and dealt with forced marriage issues.
