Wife ordered to pay her husband £56,000 compensation for lying about her virginity in Egypt

  • The couple are still married but she has been ordered to pay him damages
  • Husband says he has depression as a result of his wife's deception

A husband who discovered his wife was not in fact a virgin is to receive £56,000 of damages from her.

A civil court in Egypt ruled that the woman who told her new husband she had never married, nor lost her virginity would have to compensate him for depression.

The Egyptian woman and her father had stated clearly in the couple's marriage contract that she had never been married or had sex.

He also accused his wife of undergoing surgery to appear as though she was still a virgin to defraud him.

A woman in Egypt has been ordered to pay damages to her husband for lying about her virginity and her marital status

Marital fraud: A woman in Egypt has been ordered to pay damages to her husband for lying about her virginity and her marital status

The couple had been married for three years, and had a child together, when the husband received an anonymous message telling him she had in fact been married before.

Religious customs mean that for many Egyptians there should be no sex before marriage.

The husband was sent a copy of his wife's divorce documents as proof.

Despite having to pay her husband damages, the man has not yet sued his wife for a divorce.

The institution of marriage in Egypt has been in limbo since the fall of President Mubarak in 2011.

New proposals by the Egyptian parliament to reduce the legal age for girls to marry to 14-years-old come just 4 years after a successful campaign increased the age limit to 18-years-old.

Because of the stigma of sex before marriage, many unmarried couples in recent years have been living together under 'urfi' marriages, which are unregistered, informal contracts.

However, there have been suggestions of new laws to make the practice illegal.

Virginity has become a highly politicised issue.

In 2011, virginity tests were banned in Egypt's military prisons, suggesting a move towards women having greater privacy over their sexual relations.

Female detainees who were unmarried were found to have been given virginity tests as part of their medical check-ups, but this has now been outlawed.

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