Jan 2004 - Issue 1

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Honor Killings

Due to recent media attention, the problem of ?honor killings? has come under increasing global scrutiny. In various countries throughout the world, particularly in the Middle East and parts of South Asia, women who bring dishonor to their families because of sexual indiscretions are forced to pay a terrible price at the hands of male family members.

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Attempted murder and other forms of corporal punishment have been reported. The most severe manifestations of punishment affect only a small percentage of women, even though the notion of family honor and shame is extremely important in most communities of the Muslim world. Women from other faith groups may also be subject to similar attitudes from within their own communities in those countries. Clearly, the prevailing view that devalues and belittles women is derived from Socio-Cultural factors that are justified by a distorted and erroneous interpretation of religion, especially of Islam.

Islam recognizes and celebrates the inherent dignity bestowed by God upon all human beings regardless of race, ethnicity, gender or religion. The Quran is explicit in its emphasis on the equality of women and men before God:

And their Lord has accepted of them and answered them, ?Never will I suffer to be lost the work of any of you, whether male or female, you are members, one of another.." (3:195; see also 33:35)

Reports submitted to the United Nations Commission on Human Rights show that honor killings have occurred in Bangladesh, Great Britain, Brazil, Ecuador, Egypt, India, Israel, Italy, Jordan, Pakistan, Morocco, Sweden, Turkey, and Uganda.. But while honor killings have elicited considerable attention and outrage, human rights activists argue that they should be regarded as part of a much larger problem of violence against women.

In India, for example, more than 5,000 brides die annually because their dowries are considered insufficient, according to the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF). Crimes of passion, which are treated extremely leniently in Latin America, are the same thing with a different name, some rights advocates say.

Widney Brown, advocacy director for Human Rights Watch says:

"In countries where Islam is practiced, they're called honor killings, but dowry deaths and so-called crimes of passion have a similar dynamic in that the women are killed by male family members and the crimes are perceived as excusable or understandable.

The practice, she said, "goes across cultures and across religions." Complicity by other women in the family and the community strengthens the concept of women as property and the perception that violence against family members is a family and not a judicial issue.

Zaynab Nawaz, a program assistant for women's human rights at Amnesty International says:

"Females in the family-mothers, mothers-in-law, sisters, and cousins-frequently support the attacks. It's a community mentality,"

Hillary Mayell reports from National Geographic:

"Hundreds, if not thousands, of women are murdered by their families each year in the name of family "honor." It's difficult to get precise numbers on the phenomenon of honor killing; the murders frequently go unreported, the perpetrators unpunished, and the concept of family honor justifies the act in the eyes of some societies."

Most honor killings occur in countries where the concept of women as a vessel of the family reputation predominates, said Marsha Freemen, director of International Women's Rights Action Watch at the Hubert Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs at the University of Minnesota.

Women as Property

There is nothing in the Quran (Islamic Sacred book), that permits or sanctions honor killings. However, the view of women as property with no rights of their own is deeply rooted in Islamic culture, Tahira Shahid Khan, a professor specializing in women's issues at the Aga Khan University in Pakistan, wrote in Chained to Custom, a review of honor killings published in 1999.

Women are considered the property of the males in their family irrespective of their class, ethnic, or religious group. The owner of the property has the right to decide its fate. The concept of ownership has turned women into a commodity which can be exchanged, bought and sold."

Honor killings are perpetrated for a wide range of offenses. Marital infidelity, pre-marital sex, flirting, or even failing to serve a meal on time can all be perceived as impugning the family honor.

Amnesty International has reported on one case in which a husband murdered his wife based on a dream that she had betrayed him. In Turkey, a young woman's throat was slit in the town square because a love ballad had been dedicated to her over the radio.

In a society where most marriages are arranged by fathers and money is often exchanged, a woman's desire to choose her own husband-or to seek a divorce-can be viewed as a major act of defiance that damages the honor of the man who negotiated the deal.

Victims of Rape

Even victims of rape are vulnerable. 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 (NWFP) 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.

The teenage brothers of victims are frequently directed to commit the murder because, as minors, they would be subject to considerably lighter sentencing if there is legal action. Typically, they would serve only three months to a year.

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