He said he rejected the motion to ban child marriages as it was contrary to provisions in sharia law. A special court will also be set up under the new law to deal with child sexual abuse cases more quickly. Reuters reported last year that most complaints of child sexual abuse in Malaysia do not lead to successful prosecutions, largely due to weaknesses in the criminal justice system. Only 140 of the 12,987 cases of child sexual abuse reported to police between 2012 and July 2016 resulted in convictions. "The law is more stringent now... but not enough," Teo Nie Ching, the opposition MP who proposed the ban child marriages, told Reuters.

Source: Bangkok Post April 05, 2017 09:45 UTC