After an international outcry, Noura Hussein has been found guilty of manslaughter and sentenced to five years in jail.

Supporters of 19-year-old Noura Hussein say they’re elated at the Sudan Supreme Court’s decision to quash the verdict of premeditated murder against  her.

A global petition for this attracted more than a million signatures.

Hussein told the court that her husband got his cousins to hold her down while he raped her.

When he tried to repeat this the following day, she turned on him with a knife.

The case has underlined the issue of forced marriage, including of minors, and women’s rights in the Sudanese courts system.

Her family’s been ordered to pay a quarter of a million rands in blood money to the victim’s family.

The post Death sentence lifted on Sudanese teen who killed her rapist husband appeared first on Jean-Jacques Cornish.

Authoritative UN bodies say this is the tip of the iceberg.

They’ve recorded 40-million cases of modern slavery in 2016.

The International Labour Organization and the International Organization for Migration  say they’ve documented 25 million cases of forced labour and coercion.

They also have 15 million cases of forced marriage on their books.

A quarter of cases in the first category are in private homes.

But there are also modern slaves in factories, on construction sites, farms and fishing boats.

The victims are either too scared, drugged or too far from home to have any chance of escaping.

The post UN bodies record 40 million cases of modern slavery appeared first on Jean-Jacques Cornish.