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Fatwa CenterMaintaining Fairness Between Wives in Different Countries
Question
I've been married for 9 years and we have a child my husband left 2 years ago to work in canadaHe stayed there for a year and a half without visiting and when he came back i found out he got a second wife for 6 months now and he lives with her in Canada and he only comes to visit us every 3 months for 2 weeks and I'm telling him it's haram cuz it's not equal And what islam is saying about a man who's not equal to his wives
Answer
All perfect praise be to Allah, The Lord of the Worlds. I testify that there is none worthy of worship except Allah, and that Muhammad 
is His slave and Messenger.
A husband is obligated to spend equal time with his wives. The Sunnah contains a stern warning for any man who fails to maintain fairness between his wives. In the Sunan of Abu Dawood 
it is narrated from Abu Hurayrah 
that the Prophet, sallallahu 'alayhi wa sallam, said: “If a man has two wives and favours one of them over the other, he will come on the Day of Judgement with one side of his body hanging down.”
Furthermore, this obligation to maintain justice applies regardless of whether the two wives live in the same country or in two different, far-apart countries.
Ibn Qudamah stated in al-Mughni:
“If a man’s two wives are in two different countries, he is still required to be just between them, as it is he who chose to separate them, thus their rights are not forfeited because of that. Hence, he must either travel to the absent wife during her allocated days or bring her to where he is residing so that they may live in the same country. If she refuses to come despite being able to, then her right will be forfeited due to her Nushuz (disobedience – not fulfilling her husband’s rights). If he chooses to divide his time between the two wives while they continue living in two different countries, and it is not feasible to alternate nights, he should allocate time in intervals that are possible, such as spending a month with each wife, or more or less, based on what is reasonable and considering the distance between their locations.” [End quote]
Allah knows best.
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