tagged w/ Honor Killings
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"Shaukeen Mohammed, the father of a fourteen year old girl who had been kidnapped by a criminal in Uttar Pradesh two months ago, had sought the help of S. K Mathur, a deputy inspector of police to recover his daughter.
Instead, DIG Mathur suggested his daughter had in fact eloped and said had it been one of his relatives he would have shot her dead.
“I don’t have magical power to recover your daughter. If your daughter has eloped then you should be ashamed of it. I would have killed my sister if she had eloped or else I would have committed suicide,” Mr Mohammed was told, according to the video footage.
The officer’s comments provoked outraged among women’s rights campaigners but highlighted the wider acceptance of “honour killings” in northern India.
According to campaigners there are more than 1000 honour killings in India every year, where runaway lovers are later captured and killed by their own relatives for bringing "shame" on their families.""Shaukeen Mohammed, the father of a fourteen year old girl who had been kidnapped... more
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"At least 943 Pakistani women and girls were murdered last year for allegedly defaming their family’s honor, the country’s leading human rights group said Thursday.
The statistics highlight the growing scale of violence suffered by many women in conservative Muslim Pakistan, where they are frequently treated as second-class citizens and there is no law against domestic violence.
Despite progress on better protecting women’s rights, activists say the government needs to do more to prosecute murderers in cases largely dismissed by police as private, family affairs.
“At least 943 women were killed in the name of honor, of which 93 were minors,” wrote the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan in its annual report.""At least 943 Pakistani women and girls were murdered last year for allegedly... more
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MURDER SUSPECT YASER SAID ON FBI MOST WANTED LIST FOR “KILLING” OF HIS TWO DAUGHTERS. UNLAWFUL FLIGHT TO AVOID PROSECUTION – CAPITAL MURDER- MULTIPLE. Yaser Abdel Said is wanted for murder, on January 1, 2008, Said took his two teen aged daughters for a ride in his taxi cab, under the guise of taking them to get something to eat. He drove them to a secluded park in Irving, Texas, where he shot both girls to death, see FBI WANTED POSTER CLICK HERE.
The 17- and 18-year-old girls were dating American boys, which was contrary to their father’s rules of not dating non-Muslim boys. The girls were murdered due to an “Honor Killing.” Said may have fled to UPSTATE New York . Yaser Abdel Said the suspect of his own two daughters murder is very possibly hiding in the Shrub Oak area of Westchester County NY, his son Islam Said has made numerous trips to this location after the murder of his two sisters. Yaser Abdel Said could be driving cab in the Metro New York City area, Yaser Said has always driven a cab for a living.
Full Story: http://pibillwarner.wordpress.com/2012/02/21/yaser-abdel-said-on-fbi-most-wanted-list-for-murder-of-his-two-daughters-still-at-large-he-could-be-driving-a-cab-in-nyc/MURDER SUSPECT YASER SAID ON FBI MOST WANTED LIST FOR “KILLING” OF HIS TWO... more
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Journalist Mustafa Akyol talks about the way that some local cultural practices (such as wearing a headscarf) have become linked, in the popular mind, to the articles of faith of Islam. Has the world's general idea of the Islamic faith focused too much on tradition, and not enough on core beliefs?Journalist Mustafa Akyol talks about the way that some local cultural practices (such... more
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The trial of a father accused of murdering his daughter in a suspected "honor killing" began in Phoenix on Monday.
Faleh Hassan Almaleki is accused of using his Jeep Cherokee to run over 20-year-old Noor Almaleki in October 2009. She died from her injuries days after the alleged attack, during which the mother of her boyfriend was also hurt.
The 48-year-old Muslim father was allegedly angry because he believed his daughter had become "too Westernized."
Almaleki later fled to Mexico, and then to England before being caught by authorities and shipped back to the U.S. to face trial.
"By his own admission, this was an intentional act, and the reason was that his daughter had brought shame on him and his family," Phoenix prosecutor Stephanie Low said last year, according to The Arizona Republic. "This was an attempt at an honor killing."
The case shines a light on an ancient practice that has spread around the world in recent years. It targets women for committing what a male decides is an immoral act, or acting in an immoral manner. Although largely praticed in Muslim countries, cases have been reported in Europe and South America, as well as the United States.
Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/2011/01/24/2011-01-24_trial_of_dad_accused_of_killing_daughter_in_honor_killing_begins.html#ixzz1C0THAFRhThe trial of a father accused of murdering his daughter in a suspected "honor... more
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Afghan wives turn to a fiery self infliction
as a way out
Alissa Rubin, New York Times
Even the poorest families in Afghanistan have matches and cooking fuel. The combination usually sustains life. But it also can be the makings of a horrifying escape: from poverty, from forced marriages, from the abuse and despondency that can be the fate of Afghan women.
The night before she burned herself, Gul Zada took her children to her sister’s for a family party. All seemed well. Later it emerged that she had not brought a present, and a relative had chided her for it, said her son Juma Gul. This small thing apparently broke her. Ms. Zada, who was 45, the mother of six children and who earned pitiably little cleaning houses, ended up with burns on nearly 60 percent of her body at the Herat burn hospital. Survival is difficult even at 40 percent.
The hospital here is the only medical center in Afghanistan that specifically treats victims of burning, a common form of suicide in this region, partly because the tools to do it are so readily available. Through early October, 75 women arrived with burns — most self-inflicted, others only made to look that way. That is up nearly 30 percent from last year.
It is shameful here to admit to troubles at home, and mental illness often goes undiagnosed or untreated. Ms. Zada, the hospital staff said, probably suffered from depression. The choices for Afghan women are extraordinarily restricted: Their family is their fate. There is little chance for education, little choice about whom a woman marries, no choice at all about her role in her own house. Her primary job is to serve her husband’s family. Outside that world, she is an outcast.
Returned runaways are often shot or stabbed in honor killings because the families fear they have spent time unchaperoned with a man. Women and girls are still stoned to death. Those who burn themselves but survive are often relegated to grinding Cinderella existences while their husbands marry other, untainted women.
The most sinister burn cases are actually homicides masquerading as suicides, said doctors, nurses and human rights workers. Doctors cited two recent cases where women were beaten by their husbands or in-laws, lost consciousness and awoke in the hospital to find themselves burned because they had been shoved in an oven or set on fire.
For a very few of the women who survive burnings, whether self-inflicted or done by relatives, the experience is a kind of Rubicon that helps them change their lives. Some work with lawyers who are recommended by the hospital and request a divorce. Most do not.
Unlike many women admitted to the burn hospital, Ms. Zada showed no outward signs of distress before she set herself on fire. Her life, though, was hard. Her husband is a sharecropper. She cleaned houses and at night stayed up to clean her own home — a nearly impossible task in the family’s squalid earthen and brick two-room house buffeted by the Herati winds that sweep in a layer of dust each time the door opens.
Two weeks after his wife set herself on fire, he stood by her bed as she stopped breathing.
Alissa Rubin, New York Times
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Many words come to mind after reading this article.
Democracy is not one of them.Afghan wives turn to a fiery self infliction
as a way out
Alissa Rubin, New York... more
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5,000 honour killings are reported worldwide. With honour killings on the rise in Canada, Ottawa may now add it to the Criminal Code. Mike Drolet reports.5,000 honour killings are reported worldwide. With honour killings on the rise in... more
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An Indian village on the edges of Delhi is reeling, and the whole world is in shock over the honour killings of two teenagers in love. They were beaten and tortured for hours, and eventually killed, by the girl’s father and other relatives. The reason? They wanted to get married, which was forbidden because they came from different castes.
Should we make all reasonable efforts to stamp out this practice around the world, or should we leave it well enough alone? If we decide to combat it, how should we go about it?
http://talkingskull.com/article/killing-in-name-of-honorAn Indian village on the edges of Delhi is reeling, and the whole world is in shock... more
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Feministsforchoice blogger posts this:
No seriously…. a Turkish girl was buried alive by her father for quote, “hanging out with boys.” The Huffington Post reports,
The body of a 16-year-old girl police say was buried alive by relatives in an “honor” killing carried out as punishment for talking to boys has been discovered in Kahta, Turkey.
Turkish police discovered the body after acting on an anonymous tip. The tipster told police that the girl was killed after a family council meeting, and had been buried under a chicken pen. Police say that the girl had complained two months earlier that her grandfather beat her for talking to boys.
The girl, identified by police only by her initials M.M., was said to have a large amount of soil in her stomach and lungs, indicating she had been buried alive.
“The autopsy result is blood-curdling. According to our findings, the girl – who had no bruises on her body and no sign of narcotics or poison in her blood – was alive and fully conscious when she was buried,” one anonymous expert said.
The girl had been reported as missing by her family. Police have arrested her father, mother and grandfather. Her mother has been released but her father and grandfather are awaiting trial.
Not only was MM arbitrarily killed because of her oh-so-rebellious decision to interact with people of the opposite sex, she was buried alive AFTER her family had a round-table discussion about her “unacceptable” disobedience. In addition, her grandfather had already beaten her months prior for talking to boys. I can’t even muster an adequate reaction to something so horrifying. I suppose I probably shouldn’t be so surprised considering the fact that over 200 “honor” killings happen each year in Turkey alone. If that doesn’t frighten you… it should.
Honor killings are rooted in the idea of male-supremacy; the belief that men have some divine honor that must be protected from the frivolous, immoral behavior of women. Thousands of men around the globe literally justify killing the women in their family under the guise that they are protecting their families honor. In fact, according to the United Nations, over 5,000 honor killings occur worldwide each year. That number is also speculative because it doesn’t account for the underreported instances of violence against women in the form of honor killings.
Let us also be careful not to get it twisted. Honor killings are not isolated to concentrated places on the globe and they are most certainly not happening “out there” in far away, exotic places. Appropriating this type of colonialist narrative would be extremely problematic. Honor Killings are simply a representation of global violence against women that has no borders, religious affiliations, or national boundaries.Feministsforchoice blogger posts this:
No seriously…. a Turkish girl was... more
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The lawyers for Aysha and Mohamed Bary, the parents of Fathima Rifqa Bary, the 17 year-old Muslim girl who converted to Christianity, assured Orange County District Court today that there is no such thing as honor killing in Islam.
Romin Iqbal assured Circuit Judge Daniel Dawson that such killings are “cultural and tribal” and are not related to “the Islamic religious practice.”The lawyers for Aysha and Mohamed Bary, the parents of Fathima Rifqa Bary, the 17... more
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Rifqa Bary, 17, claims she will be the victim of an honor killing if she is forced to be reunited with her parents. Bary, hailed by some as a Christian heroine, ran away from her home in Columbus, Ohio, claiming she feared for her life. Bary ran away to an Evangelical church in Orlando, Florida. Bary claims her Muslim family threatened to kill her for converting to Christianity.
------------------------------Rifqa Bary, 17, claims she will be the victim of an honor killing if she is forced to... more
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Jawdat al-Najar bludgeoned his 27=year=old divorced daughter to death after he heard her speaking on the phone with a man. The Palestinian Center for Human Rights says 9 people have been killed in 2009 in honor killings. The murderers often receive a three year civil sentence.Jawdat al-Najar bludgeoned his 27=year=old divorced daughter to death after he heard... more
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Saudi Arabia made headlines recently when two young Saudi women, Reem, 21, and Nouf, 19 were murdered by their brother who was attempting to restore his family’s honor. What had the women done to dishonor their family? They had spoken to men in public.
Saudi Arabian law prohibits men and women from mingling in public. (A few other Saudi laws include: amputating the limbs of robbers, flogging those who are drunk, and prohibiting women from driving.)
The Saudi Arabian religious police enforce the law that proscribes men and women from ‘mixing’ in public, and a women’s rights group is blaming the police for this murder: had the women not been arrested, the brother wouldn’t have been compelled to slay his sisters, who he thought were shaming his family. Reem and Nouf’s father was present during the murder, and he approved his son’s actions.Saudi Arabia made headlines recently when two young Saudi women, Reem, 21, and Nouf,... more
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From rape and forced marriage to honor killings and the exchange of girls to resolve disputes, violence against women in Afghanistan is growing increasingly common and going largely unpunished, says a United Nations report released Wednesday.
“This report paints a detailed and deeply disturbing picture of the situation facing many Afghan women today,” UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay said of the 32-page report issued jointly by her office (OHCHR) and the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA).
“The limited space that opened up for Afghan women following the demise of the Taliban regime in 2001 is under sustained attack, not just by the Taliban themselves, but by deeply engrained cultural practices and customs, and – despite a number of significant advances in terms of the creation of new legislation and institutions – by a chronic failure at all levels of government to advance the protection of women’s rights in Afghanistan.”
*************CONTINUES*******************From rape and forced marriage to honor killings and the exchange of girls to resolve... more
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Even though Islam and Prophet Mohammad has allowed to marry with choice of freedom, majority of the people in Pakistan are not ready to practice what they preach about marriage. Almost all parents are aware of this fact and the right of an individual to marry and have family with choice and freedom, but they don't allow their own children to marry by love or choice.
So many areas in Pakistan, nowadays, have such incidents in which the boy or girl have been murdered and killed just because they did a love marriage.
A shameful situation for Muslim Community, which needs to be addressed by Government of Pakistan and High level clerics so that people put this in their practice not to bother youth about their marriage issues.
This is their basic right to marry and have family. Some parents are so ignorant that they pressurized their kids with threat of taking off their name from the will so that they won't be able to et anything from the property or wealth. Some parents beat their kids and try to scare them off from marrying with their choice of bride or groom.
A shameful situation for Pakistan.Even though Islam and Prophet Mohammad has allowed to marry with choice of freedom,... more
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I hate to look out on other cultures for crazy stuff when we have so much at home, but these honor killings of women are among the worst crimes I can imagine. This is simply genocide against women.
These guys are giving men everywhere a bad name.
Oh, and for any who would be confused about "honor:" There is no worse dishonor for a family than to declare war on family members. It shows how broken your core values are.I hate to look out on other cultures for crazy stuff when we have so much at home, but... more
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****Here's an interesting opinion piece on Honor Killings and Islam from OhMyNews - a citizen journalism newspaper based in Korea.****
Honor killings are perhaps the most severe of all suppressive acts against women. The term honor killing refers to the murder of a woman because she has committed adultery, been involved in a love affair, married against the approval of her family or has committed, or is suspected to have committed, some other sexual offense.
My endeavors to write about these merciless acts are the product of the pain I have felt for the eternal endurance of these women.
The most bitter truth is that the murderers are none other than members of the woman's family, usually brothers, fathers, cousins or other male relatives.
The murderers justify their crime with the belief that the woman's acts have brought shame and dishonor to the family, and that in order to cleanse that vice she must be killed. They take this as an undeniable fact.
The U.N. estimates that up to 5,000 honor killings take place every year. They happen across the world, in rural India and urban North America. Muslims, Sikhs and Christians are guilty of the act, but in the media it is Islam that is most frequently associated with this brutal and unpardonable crime.
I will show in this article that honor killings are not, as many people mistakenly believe, the product of Islam.
Like many people I used to think that honor killings were supported by Islam. Some years ago now I heard the story of a Muslim girl who fled from her family because her brothers were looking for her in order to kill her.
The reason?
She had had an affair with a foreign guy of some other religion. When her family found out about it, they chased her to kill her in order to cleanse their name of her "vice."
She took refuge in a European country and after many years wrote the story of her suffering. At that time I thought she was the victim of religious rules.
Many years passed before I thought about honor killings again, then on the Web site of the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) I read about an 18-year-old girl alleged to be a victim of an honor killing.
There are thousands of such incidents. Sometimes women are murdered because they were simply talking to a man, other times because they are thought to have dishonored their families by being victims of rape.
According to Hillary Mayell writing for National Geographic News:
"In a widely reported case in March of 1999, a 16-year-old mentally retarded girl who was raped in the Northwest Frontier province of Pakistan was turned over to her tribe's judicial council. Even though the crime was reported to the police and the perpetrator was arrested, the Pathan tribesmen decided that she had brought shame to her tribe and she was killed in front of a tribal gathering."
Many sad examples of honor killings can be found on the Web site of the International Campaign Against Honour Killings.
Because the popular perception associates Islam with honor killings I decided to find out what Islam really has to say about it.
The first point that must be made is that tyranny over women is not confined to Islamic cultures and it predates Islam. For centuries women across the world have been treated as less than human. Domestic violence and the murder of women by their husbands and boyfriends are a very common problem in the West, just as they are in the East.
Honor killings come about because the women live in cultures where they and their sexuality are treated as family property. In many past and present cultures in the Islamic and non-Islamic world enormous value has been placed on female virginity and chastity. The cultural concept is still so strong in many places that one can say that the situation is almost hopeless.****Here's an interesting opinion piece on Honor Killings and Islam from OhMyNews... more
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An attractive 16-year-old Muslim teenager was stabbed to death 23 times by her elder brother "to protect the family's honour" after he tricked her in to meeting him at a McDonald's burger bar car park.
Dark haired Morsal Obeidi was the daughter of an Afghan jet fighter pilot who fled the country after the Taleban came to power.
The court was told dark-haired Morsal liked listening to Western music and wearing make up. She also wore mini-skirts and tight jeans and enjoyed going out to discos with pals she met at school.
But instead, her brother, Ahmad, wanted her to wear a veil and go to a mosque for daily prayers.
Although he enjoyed going out drinking with his mates Ahmad did not think it was suitable for his sister to do the same.
The so-called 'honour killing' was allegedly the tragic end to Ahmad's violence against his young and pretty sister.
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Is an "honor killing" ever justified?An attractive 16-year-old Muslim teenager was stabbed to death 23 times by her elder... more
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Authorities in the southern Iraqi city of Basra have admitted they are powerless to prevent 'honour killings' in the city following a 70 per cent increase in religious murders during the past year.
There has been no improvement in conviction rates for these killings. So far this year, 81 women in the city have been murdered for allegedly bringing shame on their families. Only five people have been convicted.
During 2007 the Basra security committee recorded 47 'honour killings' and three convictions. One lawyer in the city described how police were actively protecting perpetrators and said that a woman in Basra could now be murdered by hired hitmen for as little as $100 (£65).
MORE @ LINKAuthorities in the southern Iraqi city of Basra have admitted they are powerless to... more
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Fathers and husbands who openly hire assassins on the streets of the city are going unpunished.
Authorities in the southern Iraqi city of Basra have admitted they are powerless to prevent 'honour killings' in the city following a 70 per cent increase in religious murders during the past year.
There has been no improvement in conviction rates for these killings. So far this year, 81 women in the city have been murdered for allegedly bringing shame on their families. Only five people have been convicted.
During 2007 the Basra security committee recorded 47 'honour killings' and three convictions. One lawyer in the city described how police were actively protecting perpetrators and said that a woman in Basra could now be murdered by hired hitmen for as little as $100 (£65).
The figures come despite international outrage which followed The Observer's coverage of the death of 17-year-old Rand Abdel-Qader, who was murdered by her father last April in an 'honour killing' after falling in love with a British soldier in Basra. The 4,000 British troops stationed in the city since the invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein in 2003 withdrew to the airport last September.
Rand Abdel-Qader was killed after her family discovered that she had formed a friendship with a 22-year-old infantryman whom she knew as Paul. She was suffocated by her father then hacked at with a knife. Abdel-Qader Ali was subsequently arrested and released without charge.
Rand's mother, Leila Hussein, who divorced her husband after the killing, went into hiding but was tracked down weeks later and assassinated by an unknown gunman. Her husband had told The Observer that police had congratulated him for killing his daughter.
Seven months after the murders, the problem of these killings in Basra has become worse, according to lawyers. Ali Azize Raja'a, an Iraqi prosecutor who has represented the victims of 32 'honour killings' since 2004, said that, despite accumulating sufficient evidence to prove who was responsible in each murder, he had won only one case.
More at link...Fathers and husbands who openly hire assassins on the streets of the city are going... more
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