A member of Egypt's parliamentary Human Rights Committee has sparked controversy after proposing an amendment to Article 20 of the country's Personal Status Law, which, if approved, would deny Egyptian women the right to divorce except in cases of "extreme harm to the wife." 

If given a nod by the House of Representatives, the revised legislation would restrict "khul," also known as "no-fault divorce," to cases of a husband's infidelity, impotence, infertility, imprisonment, severe physical abuse and abandonment of the wife for more than two years.

Khul is a procedure under Sharia whereby a wife may initiate divorce by forfeiting her right to alimony and returning the dowry and other gifts that she received from her husband and his family. The Islamic divorce procedure, introduced in Egypt in 2000, has been hailed by Egyptian media as "groundbreaking," as it granted Egyptian women a long-denied right to divorce.

Atef Makhalif, member of parliament from Mataria, who proposed the amendment, has justified it citing "the ever-increasing divorce rates in Egypt," which, he said, "pose an ominous threat to the society."