New Laws on Divorce Part I

In accordance with article 1133 of the Iranian civil law, established on the holy Shari’a of Islam, “a husband is, at any time, able to divorce his wife”. Iranian legislators consider new regulations necessary for restricting the modes of the interpretation of the article, and limiting a husband’s right to divorce as well as protecting the rights of a woman approaching a divorce. The husband has to observe some formalities, which limit his right to divorce, such as having a marital court issue a certificate of the lack of any chance of a continued marital life. Some laws passed are imperative, and are defined in the 1371 amendment law of regulations for a divorce. These laws are comprised of the following four items: the payment of the marriage portion in accordance with the rate of inflation, an obligatory gift apart from the marriage portion, the quantum meruit, and the alimony for the period of the abstention in the case of divorce.In contrast, other laws are not imperative, but make the fulfillment of a condition obligatory on a mutual agreement upon it at the time of making the marriage contract. One of these laws is the agreement about sharing, with the wife, the property that the husband accumulates during the marital life. The agreement is one of those that the Supreme Court proposed and included in marriage contracts by way of its instructions 1,34823 and 1,31823 of the years 1361 and 1362, respectively.