©Copyright Legal Women Limited 2026
My personal story is not unique – it still happens today, but I want all women and girls to know that there is hope.
I was born and raised in the UK in a context where my value was determined by notions of family “honour” and “unwritten honour codes” rather than by my rights or individuality. My father’s “honour” mattered more to him than me. From childhood, my movements, appearance, relationships, and ambitions were tightly controlled. School became my only place of freedom, and I developed a love of English.
By around twelve or thirteen, I was unknowingly and without my consent ‘engaged’ to male abroad. Over the following years, coercive, violent, and controlling behaviour escalated. Despite seeking help from teachers and medical professionals no one intervened. After leaving school, I was denied further education and kept at home for two years – my world controlled.
Just before my eighteenth birthday, I was taken to a remote village in Pakistan under the pretence of a holiday. When the man’s family arrived en masse demanding an immediate marriage, I refused –accepting that this placed my life at risk. I was subjected to prolonged violence, resulting in severe injuries. Fearing my life was in imminent danger, my mother—herself under extreme threat—fled with me to a relative’s home and resisted intense community pressure to force me into marriage. One night, she concealed me in a burqa and hid me in a vehicle, with another relative’s help - we travelled to the airport. I knew, if discovered, both she and her relative could be killed for helping me escape.
Returning to the UK did not end the abuse. I was severely unwell, with visible, non-self-inflicted injuries, yet the underlying cause was overlooked by medical professional. Community pressure to enforce a marriage persisted, and when I tried to intervene to protect my mother, she became complicit. The families attempted to fabricate evidence of a romantic relationship with the same individual to secure a visa for him and compelled me into a factory job. Notwithstanding these circumstances, I secured an administration job and was promoted twice in the first year, which I concealed to preserve a degree of independence. My efforts to seek a compromise – namely a real arranged marriage in the UK affording basic autonomy – were rejected. The violence escalated — including an attack with scissors which later required emergency surgery to my hand.
I lived under intense pressure, surveillance, uncertainty and violence for two years before making the decision to leave home permanently—my initial aim was twenty days of freedom, one day for every year I had been alive, everything else was a bonus. But I also became a ‘pursued’ orphan overnight, knowing I could be tracked, forced back, and harmed – potentially killed to restore perceived “honour.”
With the support of my manager and especially two police officers —PCs Ray Russell and Bob Russell, both ahead of their time - I was safeguarded at a time when I believed no one could protect me or would believe me. They recognised my situation, listened, and acted. Their intervention was life-saving: they ensured I would be looked for if I went missing. For a young woman living in fear of her own family, that belief was transformative – it affirmed I mattered. Without it, I would not be alive today, as others who have come after me are not.
My family continued to pursue me through various means, including engaging a private investigator. I was forced to rebuild my life in isolation, initially under a different name, without familial support, while managing ongoing trauma and fear. With police support, I gradually regained a measure of control over my life. Encouraged by PC Ray Russell, who played a central role in my protection, I went on to join the police service and later qualified as a lawyer – both motivated by my desire to protect the most vulnerable and give them a voice. I would not be here today without his support.
In 2019, after his passing, PC Russell’s son shared that his father wondered whether he had done enough to protect me. I never had the chance to tell him he had – that in my most vulnerable moments, his actions made the difference. His son shared how proud he would have been of who I have become. PC Russell’s belief in me endures, shaping my commitment to strengthen protection, advance prevention, and ensure survivors are truly seen and heard – so more lives can be safeguarded, and futures reclaimed.
The CSW70 2026 theme is “access to justice for all women and girls”. For me, true justice begins before court. It is about effective policy, legislation and operational practices that are survivor centred and informed, removing intersectional barriers, and eliminating systemic failures ensuring systems and responses are effective for all women and girls. It is harm prevention – education and empowerment; protection and effective safeguarding; and prosecution and the relentless pursuit of offenders.
As a survivor, subject matter expert (SME), former police officer, and police lawyer and now lawyer in the Government Legal Department - I have a unique understanding and expertise of how the system operates and the gaps. Education, policing, and the legal profession collectively empowers and helps me to give a voice to the voiceless and unseen –as I was, to drive meaningful change, and improve outcomes for survivors – accepting that nothing is perfect and there is more to do.
Leveraging that expertise, I have dedicated my career and voluntary work to improving the UK’s response to forced marriage (FM) and honour-based abuse (HBA). I have, as an SME, contributed to strategic, legislative, and operational reforms through collaboration with the joint Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) and the Home Office Forced Marriage Unit (FMU) and working with Non-Governmental Organisations (NGO). I have pursued academic goals, including qualifying as a lawyer and attaining an LLM in International Human Rights, helped design and deliver the His Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services inspection of 43 police forces, and offered survivor-informed insight across government and frontline systems for over fourteen years. My work has largely been self-funded and has contributed to key legislative and policy developments, including the criminalisation of FM, breaches of Forced Marriage Protection Orders and Female Genital Mutilation Protection Orders, statutory guidance, the development and introduction of a statutory definition of HBA, and raising the minimum legal age of marriage. I have also been involved in sustained capability building through awareness and training across law enforcement, social care, the judiciary, education, healthcare, and registrars, alongside international engagement (including delivering input to conferences in the US, speaking before the Swedish Parliament, and an FCDO trip to Hong Kong). This work has been recognised through an NGO award, a Home Secretary’s Award, an OBE, and a UN Women UK award.
HM Governments (HMG) Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG) Strategy.
It is important to note, significant progress has been made through successive VAWG strategies, legislative reforms, enhanced statutory guidance, and strengthened safeguarding pathways. But as always challenges remain and new risks emerge for example technology-facilitated abuse– as does understanding, and responses. HBA, FM and female genital mutilation (FGM) are grave violations of fundamental human rights, often committed by the very people who should provide protection and care. Their impacts are profound - both physical and emotional, long-lasting, and intergenerational. Policy, legislative and operational responses must remain survivor-centred, trauma-informed and evidence-based.
I welcome the Governments VAWG Strategy 2025, its commitment to halving VAWG within a decade, and its explicit inclusion of HBA, FM and FGM. The whole-of-government and whole-of-society approach — alongside the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) VAWG Strategy 2025-2030, and the National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC) Protocol on handling HBA and FM, and framework for FGM, and FMU training, work on the HBA statutory definition, new e-module tools, risk assessments, and protective orders — will help to strengthen prevention and early intervention. The relentless pursuit of perpetrators and victim and survivor support are also key to effective protection and societal change, as is making tackling VAWG a priority for everyone as part of delivery under the HMG Strategy 2025.
It was a privilege to attend the second Joint 2026 Multi-Agency Honour-Based Abuse Conference hosted by the CPS, Home Office, and the NPCC. This conference brought together NGOs and SMEs to improve victim and survivor outcomes – and is another key element of HMG VAWG Strategy 2025, through which we can collaboratively drive delivery of the Strategy.
I remain committed to working with government, statutory agencies, and specialist organisations and NGOs to ensure that survivor voices shape every part of the response — policy, legislation, frontline practice, and prevention.
Each of us has a role in safeguarding those at risk. We must see, hear, and help – and not turn away - lives depend on it. I am living proof of what becomes possible when someone is given the chance to live free from fear — and the opportunity to rebuild their life with dignity, safety, and hope.
HBA is not a single crime, but a devastating pattern of coercion, control and violence used to punish perceived ‘dishonour’ within families or communities. It spans serious offences—from FM and sexual and physical violence to coercive control, harmful practices such as FGM, and harassment, abduction or in extreme cases murder —often triggered simply by an individual exercising their own autonomy or choice - in relationships, identity, education, or lifestyle.
Framed as ‘honour’, this abuse is about power—stripping victims of identity, isolating them, and trapping them in fear, often hidden behind subtle warning signs. HBA is a safeguarding emergency requiring urgent, coordinated action—because those around the victim may have only one chance to recognise the signs and intervene. If you are concerned, act—learn, seek guidance, and listen (HM Government Multi-agency practice guidelines: Handling cases of Forced Marriage). One person believing and supporting a victim can change a life. I know the power of that intervention—because I did not have a voice until someone believed me and empowered me to find it. One voice, one moment of courage, can be the difference between silence and survival.
To those in need of help, please reach out – do not suffer in silence, there are other options. Please contact the FMU they list NGOs that can help (https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/forced-marriage-resource-pack/forced-marriage-resource-pack and https://www.gov.uk/female-genital-mutilation-help-advice), speak to health, social care, or educational professionals – tell them what is happening.
Rashid Begum OBE
Senior Solicitor
Access To Justice For All Women and Girls
By Rashid Begum OBE