Iceland\u2019s minister for children and education has resigned after admitting she had a child with a teenager more than three and a half decades ago, according to Icelandic media. <\/p>\n
\u00c1sthildur L\u00f3a Th\u00f3rsd\u00f3ttir revealed that she had started a relationship with a 15-year-old boy when she was 22 and had a son with him, Iceland\u2019s public broadcaster RUV reported on Thursday. <\/p>\n
Th\u00f3rsd\u00f3ttir met the boy while working as a counselor for a religious group, the Icelandic broadcaster said, before giving birth to his child when she was 23 and he was 16. <\/p>\n
The age of consent is 15, according to the country\u2019s penal code. However, it is illegal for adults to have sexual relations with a child under 18 if they are entrusted to teach them, with perpetrators facing up to 12 years in prison. <\/p>\n
The father told RUV he had never seen himself as a victim in this situation, but noted that he was in a difficult place in his life and at home turned to the church group for support. <\/p>\n
Iceland\u2019s public broadcaster reported that the relationship was kept secret but that the father was present for the birth of his child and initially allowed contact, but nearly all access was cut off before his son turned 1. <\/p>\n
He was however required to pay child support for 18 years. <\/p>\n
The young father sought assistance from the Ministry of Justice and the church\u2019s family service to see his child, but Th\u00f3rsd\u00f3ttir refused him visitation rights, according to Iceland\u2019s public broadcaster. <\/p>\n
Shortly after RUV\u2019s report on Thursday, Th\u00f3rsd\u00f3ttir resigned from her ministerial position, the public broadcaster said. She will continue to represent the People\u2019s Party as a member of parliament. <\/p>\n
Iceland\u2019s prime minister said Th\u00f3rsd\u00f3ttir had met with the country\u2019s three party leaders but it had been her decision to resign, according to RUV. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe discussed the options together and heard her account of the matter in detail for the first time at that meeting,\u201d Prime Minister Kristr\u00fan Frostad\u00f3ttir said at a news conference Friday, RUV reported. The leader reiterated that Th\u00f3rsd\u00f3ttir had swiftly taken responsibility by resigning. <\/p>\n
\u201cOf course, this is an unfortunate matter, but it has nothing to do with our work,\u201d Frostad\u00f3ttir said, adding that the prime minister\u2019s office had not finished investigating the matter since it was brought to their attention a week ago. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n
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Iceland\u2019s minister for children and education has resigned after admitting she had a child with a teenager more than three and a half decades ago, according to Icelandic media. \u00c1sthildur L\u00f3a Th\u00f3rsd\u00f3ttir revealed that she…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5506,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[118],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5505","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5505","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5505"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5505\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5506"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5505"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5505"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5505"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}