Honor Killings: Excerpts And Links

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Jordanian Parliament Supports Impunity For Honor Killings

(01/27/00) -- Human Rights Watch today condemned the failure of the Jordanian Lower House to end impunity for men who murder female family members in the name of preserving the "honor" of the family. "For too long, men in Jordan have been getting away with murder," said Regan Ralph, executive director of the Women's Rights Division at Human Rights Watch. "This vote is a slap in the face of Jordanian women who have been organizing to stop the killings."

http://hrw.org/english/docs/2000/01/27/jordan364.htm


Current Status of Honor Killings:

Many people find the practice of honor killings to be unacceptable, but the practice still continues. In some countries such as Jordan, Morocco and Syria, “honor crimes” are legally sanctioned and defense of the family honor is considered a mitigating factor.

Article 340 of the Penal Code of Jordan used to contain an exemption from penalty if a man killed his wife or female relative after finding her “committing adultery with another.” This Article has since been repealed, but there are other Articles that allow for a reduced sentence if the men were "provoked" into performing the murder. Article 548 of the Penal Code of Syria also provides an exemption from penalty if a man kills or injures his wife or female after finding her committing adultery or other “illegitimate sexual acts with another.”

Honor Killings in the News:

Sixteen-year-old Hsehu Yones was stabbed to death by her father, Abdullah Jones, on October 12, 2002, for having a Christian boyfriend and becoming "Westernized". According to Scotland yard, the stabbing is believed to be among 12 honor killings in the UK last year. On September 29th, 2003 Abdullah Jones was given a life sentence for his crime, showing the intolerance of honor killings in the UK.

http://womensissues.about.com/cs/hon...orkillings.htm


Honor Killing
As defined by UNICEF
'Honor killing' is an ancient practice in which men kill female relatives in the name of family 'honor' for forced or suspected sexual activity outside marriage, even when they have been victims of rape. Reports indicate that offenders are often under 18 and that in their communities they are sometimes treated as heroes. These killings have been reported in Pakistan, Jordan, Yemen, Lebanon, Egypt, the Gaza strip and West Bank.

http://www.vday.org/contents/violenc...y/honorkilling


A human-rights report published in March 1999 stated that "honour" killings took the lives of 888 women in the single province of Punjab in 1998 (Hassan, "The Fate of Pakistani Women"). Similar figures were recorded for 1999. In Sindh province, some 300 women died in 1997, according to Pakistan's independent Human Rights Commission. (Goldenberg, "A Question of Honour.") It is unknown how many women are maimed or disfigured for life in attacks that fall short of murder. Pamela Constable describes one such case:

Zahida Perveen's head is shrouded in a white cotton veil, which she self-consciously tightens every few moments. But when she reaches down to her baby daughter, the veil falls away to reveal the face of one of Pakistan's most horrific social ills, broadly known as "honour" crimes. Perveen's eyes are empty sockets of unseeing flesh, her earlobes have been sliced off, and her nose is a gaping, reddened stump of bone. Sixteen months ago, her husband, in a fit of rage over her alleged affair with a brother-in-law, bound her hands and feet and slashed her with a razor and knife. She was three months pregnant at the time. "He came home from the mosque and accused me of having a bad character," the tiny, 32-year-old woman murmured as she awaited a court hearing ... "I told him it was not true, but he didn't believe me. He caught me and tied me up, and then he started cutting my face. He never said a word except, "This is your last night." (Constable, "The Price of 'Honour'," The Gazette (Montreal), May 22, 2000.)

http://www.gendercide.org/case_honour.html


Several thousand women a year are victims of honor killings. Numerous murders are ruled an accident, suicide, or family dispute, if they're reported at all. Police and government officials are often bribed to ignore crimes and hinder investigations. A woman beaten, burned, strangled, shot, or stabbed to death is often ruled a suicide, even when there are multiple wounds.
Many women are killed and buried in unmarked graves; their very existence is removed from community and clan records. The fact that so many murders go unreported is indicative of the status of women and the role of culture in fundamentalist Islamic countries. "It shows that women are still sometimes seen as commodities that are owned by men," says Carolyn Hannan, director of the United Nations Division for the Advancement of Women.
A Palestinian family at a refugee camp in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip.

In the Palestinian communities of the West Bank, Gaza Strip, Israel, and Jordan, women are executed in their homes, in open fields, and occasionally in public, sometimes before crowds of cheering onlookers. Honor killings account for virtually all of the murders of Palestinian women in these areas.
Honor killings occur for a variety of offenses, including allegations of premarital or extramarital sex, refusing an arranged marriage, attempting to obtain a divorce, or simply talking with a man. If a woman brings shame to the family, her male relatives are bound by duty and culture to kill her. "A woman shamed is like rotting flesh," a Palestinian merchant tells me. "If it is not cut away, it will consume the body. What I mean is the whole family will be tainted if she is not killed."
Among Arabs, marriage is traditionally a family affair, not a personal choice. Girls are often pressured into arranged marriages, while boys are not. "I was forced to marry my cousin," laments a young Palestinian woman. "I hated him. He beat me and humiliated me in front of his family and friends. But what could I do? If I had fled, I would have been killed."

http://www.worldandi.com/newhome/pub.../may/clpub.asp


Though it may be too late for Mustafa's wife, and more than 1,200 other women in Pakistan killed last year in the name of "family honor," President Pervez Musharraf signed a bill last week making honor killing an explicit criminal act punishable by death. Rights activists say it is a small step forward and that more must be done to change tribal and feudal attitudes that treat women like property.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/...in668007.shtml


While the Turkish penal code does not appear to condone honor killings, traditional society has found a way out - usually honor killings are committed by under age male family members who, by virtue of their age, escape the maximum punishment.

The Iranian penal code, according to the 1993 book Women of Iran by Iranian feminists 'recognizes the right' of a father or brother to murder a girl found guilty of pre-marital sex' by imposing a maximum sentence of only six months in jail or a fine,' adding that 'In the case of a husband murdering an adulterous wife, there is of course no sentence' [ldots].

Honor killings are not, however, the unique preserve of Muslim societies. They were until very recently a recognized feature of the Balkan regions. In parts of the former Yugoslavia, tribal codes withstood the socialist regime's attempts to implement legislation which would have introduced and preserved the legal equality of women.

http://www.wwhr.org/?id=777


According to Amnesty International (AI), every year, at least 1,000 women and girls die in 'honor killings' in Pakistan. Besides the fact that women are being murdered for 'honor' in India and other South Asian countries, British-Asian women are also being killed in the United Kingdom... However, honor killings in the UK have alarmed the Met Police sufficiently. Its officers have set up a nationwide murder prevention scheme into the killing or disappearance of more than 100 British women over the last decade, to see whether they were the victims of honor killings and to examine how best to prevent such murders...

...UK women's rights campaigners who work with British-Asian communities believe that forced marriages - in which women are threatened with death if they refuse to marry the man of their family's choice - can be a precursor to honor killings.

"In almost all forced marriage cases we deal with, 95 per cent of our clients have had the threat of death," says Kulbir Randhawa, coordinator and counselor at the national charity, the London-based Asian Family Counseling Service. AFCS advises Asian women referred to the service by the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO). So far, AFCS has not had any clients murdered in honor killings.

However, honor killings in the UK have alarmed the Met Police sufficiently. Its officers have set up a nationwide murder prevention scheme into the killing or disappearance of more than 100 British women over the last decade, to see whether they were the victims of honor killings and to examine how best to prevent such murders.

UK women's rights campaigners who work with British-Asian communities believe that forced marriages - in which women are threatened with death if they refuse to marry the man of their family's choice - can be a precursor to honor killings.

"In almost all forced marriage cases we deal with, 95 per cent of our clients have had the threat of death," says Kulbir Randhawa, coordinator and counselor at the national charity, the London-based Asian Family Counseling Service. AFCS advises Asian women referred to the service by the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO). So far, AFCS has not had any clients murdered in honor killings.

http://www.boloji.com/wfs3/wfs312.htm


In Jordan, one woman was knifed to death because she wanted to continue her education and refused to marry the man chosen for her by her family. Another woman was shot five times because she ran away from her husband who continually beat and raped her. Another had her throat slit because her husband suspected her of adultery - he saw her speaking with a man from their village. In Pakistan, a young mother of two sons was shot dead by a family acquaintance because she had sought divorce from an abusive husband. Another woman was shot dead in front of a tribal gathering after she had been repeatedly raped by a local government official.

These murders are based on the belief that a woman is the property of her family. Should the woman’s virtue come into question, for whatever reason, or if she refuses to obey her father, husband or brother, her family’s “honor” is thought to be disgraced and the woman must be killed by a male relative to restore the family’s good name in the community. Often, women are killed because of mere suspicion that they have engaged in illicit sexual activity.

It is estimated by the United Nations Population Fund that as many as 5000 women and girls are murdered by family members each year in so-called “honor killings” around the world. In Pakistan alone, according to the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, more than 1000 women were victims of these crimes in 1999. According to the United Nations special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary and arbitrary executions, “honor killings” have been reported in Bangladesh, Brazil, Ecuador, Egypt, India, Israel, Italy, Jordan, Morocco, Pakistan, Sweden, Turkey, Uganda and the United Kingdom.

These crimes are socially sanctioned in many countries and the killers are treated with lenience. Although it may be noted that so-called “honor killings” tend to be prevalent in countries with a majority Muslim population, many Islamic leaders and scholars have condemned the practice and denied claims that it is based on religious doctrine.

In some countries such as Jordan, Morocco and Syria, “honor crimes” are also legally sanctioned and defense of the family honor is considered a mitigating factor. Article 340 of the Penal Code of Jordan, for example, provides for an exemption from penalty if a man kills his wife or female relative after finding her “committing adultery with another.” It provides for a reduction in penalty if a man kills his wife or female relative after finding her “with another in an unlawful bed.” Similarly, Article 548 of the Penal Code of Syria also provides an exemption from penalty if a man kills or injures his wife or female after finding her committing adultery or other “illegitimate sexual acts with another.” The law also provides for a reduction in penalty for a man who kills or injures his female relative after catching her in a “suspicious state with another.” Also of concern is the way in which legislation in various countries awards lesser punishment in cases where the victim is considered to have “provoked” the crime by violating cultural norms.

http://www.feminist.com/violence/spot/honor.html