Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Minister of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, whether he has taken steps with international partners to address the incidence of forced marriage of young girls and women from religious minorities in Ethiopia; and whether he has had recent discussions with his Ethiopian counterpart on this issue.

The UK is committed to stepping up our international leadership on child marriage, to give girls a greater say over their bodies and futures. We are a champion of the UN Global Programme to End Child Marriage and we have supported over 140,000 adolescent girls in Ethiopia with interventions to prevent and respond to child marriage.