A woman feared being “cursed” if she failed to hand over a three-year-old British girl for female genital mutilation (FGM) in Kenya, a court has heard.
Amina Noor, 39, is on trial at the Old Bailey charged with assisting a non-UK person to mutilate the girl’s genitalia overseas 17 years ago.
Giving evidence on Friday, Somali-born Noor said she would have been “disowned and cursed” by community members if she did not take part.
Jurors have heard that the girl was subjected to FGM on a trip to Kenya in 2006.
I didn't know whether this was going to be something that is harming (the girl) but I did not want to allow it whatever it might be. I was told I would be cursed if I refuse— Amina Noor
It is alleged she travelled with the defendant and another woman in a tuk-tuk to a private house in the east African country where the procedure took place.
The alleged offence only came to light in 2018 after the girl confided in her English teacher at school when she was aged 16.
When Noor was interviewed by police, she denied that anyone had made threats against her to force her to agree to FGM.
But in her defence in her trial, Noor said she had been told she would be disowned.
That was a pressure I had no power to do anything about— Amina Noor
She said: “I didn’t know whether this was going to be something that is harming (the girl) but I did not want to allow it whatever it might be.
“I was told I would be cursed if I refuse.”
She told jurors she “felt pain” over the threat, saying: “That was a pressure I had no power to do anything about.”
Prosecutor Deanna Heer KC asked the defendant why she had not told police before.
Noor said she did not think it was safe to say and also that she was not asked about it.
She also suggested that her words about being disowned and cursed were not relayed by the interpreter, although jurors were told translations of the interviews were agreed.
Jurors have heard the defendant was born in Somalia and moved to Kenya at the age of eight during the civil war in her home country.
She was 16 when she came to the United Kingdom and was later granted British citizenship.
The court was told that 94% of females of Somali origin living in Kenya undergo FGM, according to United Nations’ figures.
There was no dispute in the case that the girl had been subjected to FGM outside the UK by a Kenyan woman, nor that the alleged victim was a UK citizen.
The girl, who is now aged 21, cannot be identified for legal reasons.
Noor, from Harrow, north-west London, denies the charge against her and the trial continues.
