You've got alimony
- — 06 January, 2000 16:17
With all the wildly erratic laws that Australia's Parliamentarians are pro-posing to regulate your Internet usage, we should be grateful for small mercies. In the United Arab Emirates, as in several other countries where Islamic law is prevalent, the Internet is very heavily regulated indeed.
Reconciling the freewheeling Internet community with the strictures of Islam has not been an easy task for UAE lawmakers.
A court in Dubai now has to solve an even stickier question: does Islamic law count when the instrument by which it is applied is the Internet itself?
A US citizen of Arab birth, and a Muslim by religion, recently sent his wife an e-mail declaring "I divorce you". Under Islamic law, a man need only tell his wife he wants a divorce, and it's done. It's unclear, however, whether the divorce can be recognised if it's sent electronically.
Just to be on the safe side, the man has filed for divorce in a US court as well.
