The man left his wife and “disappeared” as he did not want her to have the baby. When she refused to go through with an abortion, he left her, changed his mobile number and became untraceable.

After giving birth, the woman refused to leave King Abdul Aziz Specialist Hospital in Taif for a month until her husband registers the child under his name. On arrest, the man admitted the marriage was legal and acknowledged the child was his. The couple has been married for four years and the marriage was kept secret from the husband’s family.

Misyar marriage is a legal marriage in which a wife forfeits some of her rights. In this case, the woman was living with her husband, as her parents had died.

When her husband disappeared, the woman, who lives in Makkah, decided to live with some relatives until the birth of the child. She also tried unsuccessfully to contact her husband through relatives and then decided to go to Taif where her husband lives with his family and managed to contact him and tell him she was about to give birth to his son.

The husband told her to leave him alone and that he was about to marry his cousin. She then decided to go the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice office and file a complaint, which was passed on to the police.

“I went to his father’s house and his dad told me that he had divorced me. I told his father that if he divorced me then I want my papers to prove it and to admit he is the father of my child,” the woman told a local newspaper.

The woman whose identity has not been revealed said she does not want her child to be fatherless and thrown into a shelter home.

Sheikh Mazen Ahmadi, an imam at a mosque, said it is unfair how some women suffer in misyar marriages, although it is a legitimate form of marriage. “He should be happy that he is a father now. Despite any complications, his son should be raised properly and be given everything,” he said.

“This poor woman must have been going through some difficulties to settle for a misyar marriage like many other women,” he said, adding she has rights which need to be upheld.