It is normal to marry cousin in Morocco and my firend he is thinking of marrying a cousin of his but the question on the paper he said that he would avoid. I told him he should answer it because it would come out and he said that he would say that she is from his family!!! So what do you think, has anyone married a cousin or heard of anyone and where there an complications? he is afrid and that his potetion will have problems or be regetted.

I would offer this... If he is serious about the marriage, then the visa petition is irrelevant. Sure he should try it, but isn't marriage the top priority above the visa? He needs to be 100% honest. You can't skate things by them or bend the truth. It will be discovered and go against him the future. I know in Egypt marriage to a cousin in acceptable (unless you ask my fiance...lol... he thinks it's "gross".) I think it holds true for the Islamic countries. I guess all he can do is try and to be honest.

I know an Egyptian American brother here who married his cousin and brought her here on a K-3. Unfortunately, I'm not too close to them, so I can't really go digging and find out how they did it.

It is acceptable in Morocco to marry your cousin, but my husband is like JW's fiance...he thinks its wrong. He said they have a problem with babies born with problems from the close relation.

Of course you should never lie to the consulate about this. They will find out, and once you hide something then you can bet on misery. You would be setting yourself up for failure for sure.

Marrying a cousin is very common in many Muslim/Arab countries. They generally make you take a blood test before hand and check for certain things to make sure that your babies won't have genetic problems due to the close relation in blood.

I have many cousins who have done this and none have encourtered a problem. Most embassies know this is a very common thing and don't question it.

Most people do not have problems with the marrying and it is allowed in Islam, however he come to me another question. Maybe this is a Moroccan thing because I do not understand it. If you are a dual citizen such as hisself. He has a Moroccan passport and a United States Passport (he is a citizen) and he wants to get married in Morocco. He says that they will write down your name and your number, this number is off of your id or passport. He is moroccan and it is wasy to marry another moroccan but when you are a US citizen it is more complex. Can he get married using the Moroccan id and the United States accept it or will this cause a problem. I told him that it did not matter because he is a citizen of both countries and when we get married in the states the certificate only has your name and birthday on it. Also if I have never heard of it, it is something that no looks for. Can you tell me what you think about this.

He should tell the truth about them being cousins.

I don't know anything about the ID's, but this is not something that only happens in Islam. It happens among Christians as well and all the Arabic/Muslim countries. Jordan also allows dual citizenship ( I have it) and I don't know anyone that has encountered a problem. I think he should be truthful in the matter as it is a very common thing and he should know that. I don't think getting married using the Morrocan Id has anything to do with it. He is allowed to hold dual citizenship and that is just a part of being a dual citizen.

Part of the requirement for the I-129F is that the petitioner and beneficiary are able to marry legally in the state in which the petitioner resides, is it not? If so, then your friend would have to check if his state allows marriage between first cousins.

Here is a link for state laws:

http://www.ncsl.org/programs/cyf/cousins.htm

If first cousin marriages are not allowed in his state, I suppose they could always travel to another state to get married. But I'm not sure how that affects the I-129F and the statements made therein regarding marriage eligibility. This issue seems to be linked to one that was brought up recently regarding certain states' mandatory post-divorce waiting periods and whether one is precluded during those periods from submitting an I-129F.

marrying a cousin is not illegal in all US states. Moreover, if you marry your cousion or a relative in a country or a stats where it is leagal, like Morocco, the immigration /USA govt treat this marraige as LEGAL. No issues here.

A lot of states allow marriage of cousins, I was surprised.

A few months back (maybe longer) someone started a similar topic and in that thread was a link to a list of the states that allow it...it was like 26 or 28 states that allowed 1st cousin marrages and another list of states with restrictions. I live in Illinois, and I was suprised to find that in Illinois you can marry a first cousin only if you are 50 or sterile.
Now that I think about it, that OP's problem I think was that he or she lived in a state that did not allow it, and the CO knew it and denied them for that. Tell your friend to either make sure that his state is ok or he can be resident enough in another state to show a plan to marry there. (if its his plan to marry in the US)

I posted the link in this thread as well.

I didn't open that link, its probably the same. I did try to find that old thread for Private, though. I think its too old to find now. It probably had relavant and useful discussion in it but oh well.

I'm sorry. "Ewww" is the only comment I have....