The Legal Treatment of Muslim Minority Women under the Rule of Islamic Law in Greek Thrace

Abstract

The treatment of women in the frame of Islam has become subject to lively debate, lately concentrated in domains of the West where Islamic law seeks recognition without Islam being the prevailing creed. The discussions often are focused on concerns whether Muslim women are confronted with discriminative treatment and impediments to their access to justice. In this context, Greece occupies a unique position. Greece constitutes the only European State that recognises officially a special Islamic jurisdiction. In Thrace, Mufti tribunals are considered the cornerstone of application of Islamic law and administration of Islamic justice. However, this regime has been repeatedly criticised for failing to safeguard Muslim women’s rights. This article engages with the legal treatment of the women who belong to the Muslim Minority of Western Thrace. It examines the ways in which this religious normative regime affects their access to justice and the potential impacts that are generated from their subjection to the authority of the system thereof. The analysis is based on a methodology that combines the study of domestic and international legal scholarship with insights that were drawn from the study on representative case law of the local Sharia courts and of the competent civil courts.