Honor killing
Encyclopedia
An honor killing or honour killing is the homicide
Homicide
Homicide refers to the act of a human killing another human. Murder, for example, is a type of homicide. It can also describe a person who has committed such an act, though this use is rare in modern English...

 of a member of a family or social group by other members, due to the belief of the perpetrators that the victim has brought dishonor
Honour
Honour or honor is an abstract concept entailing a perceived quality of worthiness and respectability that affects both the social standing and the self-evaluation of an individual or corporate body such as a family, school, regiment or nation...

 upon the family or community. Honor killings are directed mostly against women and girls, but have been extended to men.

The perceived dishonor is normally the result of one of the following behaviors, or the suspicion of such behaviors: dressing in a manner unacceptable to the family or community, wanting to terminate or prevent an arranged marriage or desiring to marry by own choice, especially if to a member of a social group deemed inappropriate, engaging in heterosexual acts outside marriage and engaging in homosexual
Homosexuality
Homosexuality is romantic or sexual attraction or behavior between members of the same sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, homosexuality refers to "an enduring pattern of or disposition to experience sexual, affectional, or romantic attractions" primarily or exclusively to people of the same...

 acts. United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees , also known as The UN Refugee Agency is a United Nations agency mandated to protect and support refugees at the request of a government or the UN itself and assists in their voluntary repatriation, local integration or resettlement to...

 state that claims made by LGBT
LGBT
LGBT is an initialism that collectively refers to "lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender" people. In use since the 1990s, the term "LGBT" is an adaptation of the initialism "LGB", which itself started replacing the phrase "gay community" beginning in the mid-to-late 1980s, which many within the...

 persons often reveal exposure to physical and sexual violence, extended periods of detention
Detention
Detention may refer to:*Detention *Detention *Detention, a form of punishment used in schools*"Detention" , Episode 58 of the CBS TV drama Cold Case...

, medical abuse, threat of execution and honour killing."

The United Nations Population Fund
United Nations Population Fund
The United Nations Population Fund is a UN organization. The work of the UNFPA involves promotion of the right of every woman, man and child to enjoy a life of health and equal opportunity. This is done through major national and demographic surveys and with population censuses...

 (UNFPA) estimates that perhaps as many as 5,000 women and girl
Girl
A girl is any female human from birth through childhood and adolescence to attainment of adulthood. The term may also be used to mean a young woman.-Etymology:...

s a year are killed by members of their own families. Many women's groups in the Middle East and Southwest Asia suspect the number of victims is about four times greater.

Definitions

In the modern age, the term was first used by a Dutch
Netherlands
The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...

 scholar of Turkish
Turkey
Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...

 society, Ane Nauta in 1978. Nauta sought a term that could be used to distinguish honor killings from blood feud
Feud
A feud , referred to in more extreme cases as a blood feud, vendetta, faida, or private war, is a long-running argument or fight between parties—often groups of people, especially families or clans. Feuds begin because one party perceives itself to have been attacked, insulted or wronged by another...

s.

Human Rights Watch
Human Rights Watch
Human Rights Watch is an international non-governmental organization that conducts research and advocacy on human rights. Its headquarters are in New York City and it has offices in Berlin, Beirut, Brussels, Chicago, Geneva, Johannesburg, London, Los Angeles, Moscow, Paris, San Francisco, Tokyo,...

 defines "honor killings" as follows:

Honor killings are acts of vengeance, usually death, committed by male family members against female family members, who are held to have brought dishonor upon the family. A woman can be targeted by (individuals within) her family for a variety of reasons, including: refusing to enter into an arranged marriage
Arranged marriage
An arranged marriage is a practice in which someone other than the couple getting married makes the selection of the persons to be wed, meanwhile curtailing or avoiding the process of courtship. Such marriages had deep roots in royal and aristocratic families around the world...

, being the victim of a sexual assault
Sexual assault
Sexual assault is an assault of a sexual nature on another person, or any sexual act committed without consent. Although sexual assaults most frequently are by a man on a woman, it may involve any combination of two or more men, women and children....

, seeking a divorce—even from an abusive
Domestic violence
Domestic violence, also known as domestic abuse, spousal abuse, battering, family violence, and intimate partner violence , is broadly defined as a pattern of abusive behaviors by one or both partners in an intimate relationship such as marriage, dating, family, or cohabitation...

 husband—or (allegedly) committing adultery
Adultery
Adultery is sexual infidelity to one's spouse, and is a form of extramarital sex. It originally referred only to sex between a woman who was married and a person other than her spouse. Even in cases of separation from one's spouse, an extramarital affair is still considered adultery.Adultery is...

. The mere perception that a woman has behaved in a way that "dishonors" her family is sufficient to trigger an attack on her life.


The loose term "honor killing" applies to killing of both males and females in cultures that practice it. For example, during the year 2002 in Pakistan
Pakistan
Pakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...

, it is estimated that 245 women and 137 men were killed in the name of Karo-kari
Karo-kari
In Pakistan honor killings are known locally as karo-kari . Karo-kari is part of cultural tradition in Sindh and is a compound word literally meaning "black male" and "black female , in metaphoric terms for adulterer and adulteress...

 in Sindh
Sindh
Sindh historically referred to as Ba'ab-ul-Islam , is one of the four provinces of Pakistan and historically is home to the Sindhi people. It is also locally known as the "Mehran". Though Muslims form the largest religious group in Sindh, a good number of Christians, Zoroastrians and Hindus can...

.

Some women who bridge social divides, publicly engage other communities, or adopt some of the customs or the religion of an outside group may be attacked. In countries that receive immigration, some otherwise low-status immigrant men and boys have asserted their dominant patriarchal status by inflicting honor killings on women family members who have participated in public life, for example in feminist
Feminism
Feminism is a collection of movements aimed at defining, establishing, and defending equal political, economic, and social rights and equal opportunities for women. Its concepts overlap with those of women's rights...

 and integration politics.

Men can also be the victims of honor killings by members of the family of a woman with whom they are perceived to have an inappropriate relationship.

As a cultural practice

Sharif Kanaana, professor of anthropology
Anthropology
Anthropology is the study of humanity. It has origins in the humanities, the natural sciences, and the social sciences. The term "anthropology" is from the Greek anthrōpos , "man", understood to mean mankind or humanity, and -logia , "discourse" or "study", and was first used in 1501 by German...

 at Birzeit University
Birzeit University
Birzeit University is a university located in Birzeit near Ramallah, Palestinian territories. BZU is among the foremost tertiary educational institutes in the Palestinian territories and has played a significant role in the Palestinian political dialogue.- History :The institution was originally...

, says that honor killing is:
An Amnesty International
Amnesty International
Amnesty International is an international non-governmental organisation whose stated mission is "to conduct research and generate action to prevent and end grave abuses of human rights, and to demand justice for those whose rights have been violated."Following a publication of Peter Benenson's...

 statement adds:
The lawyer and human rights activist Hina Jilani
Hina Jilani
Hina Jilani is an advocate of the Supreme Court of Pakistan and a human-rights activist from Lahore in Punjab, Pakistan.-Work:Jilani is internationally recognized for her expertise in critical human rights investigations. She started practising law in 1979, when Pakistan was under martial law...

 says, "The right to life of women in Pakistan is conditional on their obeying social norms and traditions.

Nighat Taufeeq of the women's resource center Shirkatgah (Lahore, Pakistan) says: "It is an unholy alliance that works against women: the killers take pride in what they have done, the tribal leaders condone the act and protect the killers and the police connive the cover-up."

A July 2008 Turkish study by a team from Dicle University on honor killings in the Southeastern Anatolia Region
Southeastern Anatolia Region
Southeastern Anatolia Region is one of Turkey's seven census-defined geographical regions . It is bordered by the Mediterranean Region to the west, the Eastern Anatolia Region to the north, Syria to the south, and Iraq to the southeast.-Provinces:...

, the predominantly Kurdish area of Turkey, has so far shown that little if any social stigma is attached to honor killing. It also comments that the practise is not related to a feudal societal structure, "there are also perpetrators who are well-educated university graduates. Of all those surveyed, 60 percent are either high school or university graduates or at the very least, literate."

As an act against Homosexuality

There is some evidence that homosexuality
Homosexuality
Homosexuality is romantic or sexual attraction or behavior between members of the same sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, homosexuality refers to "an enduring pattern of or disposition to experience sexual, affectional, or romantic attractions" primarily or exclusively to people of the same...

 can also be perceived as grounds for honor killing by relatives. In one case, a gay Jordan
Jordan
Jordan , officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan , Al-Mamlaka al-Urduniyya al-Hashemiyya) is a kingdom on the East Bank of the River Jordan. The country borders Saudi Arabia to the east and south-east, Iraq to the north-east, Syria to the north and the West Bank and Israel to the west, sharing...

ian man was shot and wounded by his brother. In another case, a homosexual Turkish
Turkish people
Turkish people, also known as the "Turks" , are an ethnic group primarily living in Turkey and in the former lands of the Ottoman Empire where Turkish minorities had been established in Bulgaria, Cyprus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Georgia, Greece, Kosovo, Macedonia, and Romania...

 student, Ahmet Yildiz, was shot outside a cafe and later died in hospital. Sociologists have called this Turkey
Turkey
Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...

's first publicized gay honor killing.

In the country of Brazil
Brazil
Brazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...

, honor killings show up mostly within rural regions but also in the metropolis. Non-heterosexual children, especially boys or transgirls
Trans woman
A trans woman is a male-to-female transsexual or transgender person and the term trans woman is preferred by some individuals over various medical terms. Other non-medical terms include t-girl, tg-girl and ts-girl...

, can be killed if their sexuality is disclosed. The act of honor killings in Brazil has roots in Latin America's more virulent version of machismo
Machismo
Machismo, or machoism, is a word of Spanish and Portuguese origin that describes prominently exhibited or excessive masculinity. As an attitude, machismo ranges from a personal sense of virility to a more extreme male chauvinism...

. However, it is more common for homosexual individuals to suffer some psychological and physical abuse without deadly consequences, such as being driven from their homes or being accepted, in varying degrees. The first time a non-heterosexual Brazilian suffers homophobia
Homophobia
Homophobia is a term used to refer to a range of negative attitudes and feelings towards lesbian, gay and in some cases bisexual, transgender people and behavior, although these are usually covered under other terms such as biphobia and transphobia. Definitions refer to irrational fear, with the...

, biphobia
Biphobia
Biphobia is a term used to describe aversion felt toward bisexuality and bisexuals as a social group or as individuals. People of any sexual orientation can experience such feelings of aversion...

 or transphobia
Transphobia
Transphobia is a range of negative attitudes and feelings towards transsexualism and transsexual or transgender people, based on the expression of their internal gender...

 tends to be within the family among all social groups. Feminist
Feminism
Feminism is a collection of movements aimed at defining, establishing, and defending equal political, economic, and social rights and equal opportunities for women. Its concepts overlap with those of women's rights...

 groups explain this observance by the characterization of the dominant societal attitudes in Brazil as deeply sexist and homophobic, documenting the Brazilian culture as the reason for an abnormal number, when compared to more developed countries, of homosexual youth suffering bullying or committing suicide
Suicide among LGBT youth
Researchers have found that suicide among lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and questioning youth is comparatively higher than among the general population...

. and there is a number of homophobic extermination gangs even in regions where far-right and white supremacist groups being unimaginable. Brazil is already in #2 place of this kind of movement in Latin America after Argentina
Argentina
Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...

. Since this kind of violence which is usually motivated by extremist ideologies appears to have come with great strength and very quickly to the country despite its limitations within globalization and its unique features, homophobic extermination groups may have originated in a very homophobic culture native to Brazilian society.

As a religious practice

According to Widney, Brown, the advocacy director of Human Rights Watch, deaths by family members are mostly labeled honor killings in Islamic countries. However, as noted by Tahira Shaid Khan, a professor of women’s issues in Pakistan, within the Qur'an
Qur'an
The Quran , also transliterated Qur'an, Koran, Alcoran, Qur’ān, Coran, Kuran, and al-Qur’ān, is the central religious text of Islam, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God . It is regarded widely as the finest piece of literature in the Arabic language...

 there is no mentioning of anything that allows for or justifies honor killings. The first and most basic right in the Qur'an
Qur'an
The Quran , also transliterated Qur'an, Koran, Alcoran, Qur’ān, Coran, Kuran, and al-Qur’ān, is the central religious text of Islam, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God . It is regarded widely as the finest piece of literature in the Arabic language...

 that every Muslim is expected to follow is, in fact, the right to life. As written in the Qur'an
Qur'an
The Quran , also transliterated Qur'an, Koran, Alcoran, Qur’ān, Coran, Kuran, and al-Qur’ān, is the central religious text of Islam, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God . It is regarded widely as the finest piece of literature in the Arabic language...

, It is thus believed that it is not Islam as a religion, but Islamic culture, and the prominent and long-standing view that women are considered property, as the sources of for honor killings.

Honor killings in history

As noted by Christian Arab writer, Norma Khouri, honor killings originate from the belief that a woman’s chastity is the property of her families, a cultural norm that dates back to 1200 B.C , under the rule of Hammarabi and other Assyrian tribes.

Matthew Goldstein
Matthew Goldstein
Matthew Goldstein is the current Chancellor of The City University of New York . He was appointed Chancellor on September 1, 1999, and is the first City University graduate to head the University, having received his undergraduate degree from City College...

 has also noted that honor killings were encouraged in ancient Rome, where male family members who did not take actions against the female adulterers in their family were "actively persecuted".

Lavinia, in Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus
Titus Andronicus
Titus Andronicus is a tragedy by William Shakespeare, and possibly George Peele, believed to have been written between 1588 and 1593. It is thought to be Shakespeare's first tragedy, and is often seen as his attempt to emulate the violent and bloody revenge plays of his contemporaries, which were...

, is killed by her father after having been raped and mutilated. In Lewis Grassic Gibbon
Lewis Grassic Gibbon
Lewis Grassic Gibbon was the pseudonym of James Leslie Mitchell , a Scottish writer.-Biography:...

's novel Spartacus
Spartacus (novel)
Spartacus is a historical novel by the Scottish writer Lewis Grassic Gibbon, first published under his real name of James Leslie Mitchell....

the Romans are described as killing their women who had been raped by the rebel slaves. In ancient Rome, being raped was seen as dishonorable to the point of destroying a woman's life and reputation, and honor killing was supposed to be a "merciful" act.

Locations

According to the UN in 2002:
According to Widney Brown, advocacy director for Human Rights Watch
Human Rights Watch
Human Rights Watch is an international non-governmental organization that conducts research and advocacy on human rights. Its headquarters are in New York City and it has offices in Berlin, Beirut, Brussels, Chicago, Geneva, Johannesburg, London, Los Angeles, Moscow, Paris, San Francisco, Tokyo,...

, the practice of honor killing "goes across cultures and across religions."

Europe

In 2005 Der Spiegel
Der Spiegel
Der Spiegel is a German weekly news magazine published in Hamburg. It is one of Europe's largest publications of its kind, with a weekly circulation of more than one million.-Overview:...

reported: "In the past four months, six Muslim women living in Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...

 have been killed by family members". The article went on to cover the case of Hatun Sürücü
Hatun Sürücü
Hatun "Aynur" Sürücü was a Kurdish woman living in Germany whose family was originally from Erzurum, Turkey. She was murdered at the age of 23 in Berlin, by her own youngest brother, in an honor killing...

, who was killed by her brother for not staying with the husband she was forced to marry, and of "living like a German". Precise statistics on how many women die every year in such honor killings are hard to come by, as many crimes are never reported, said Myria Boehmecke of the Tuebingen-based women's group Terre des Femmes. The group tries to protect Muslim girls and women from oppressive families. The Turkish women's organization Papatya has documented 40 instances of honor killings in Germany since 1996. Hatun Sürücü's brother was convicted of murder and jailed for nine years and three months by a German court in 2006. In March 2009 Turkish immigrant Gülsüm S. was killed for a relationship outside her family's plan for an arranged marriage. In Sweden
Sweden
Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....

 the 26-year-old Kurdish woman Fadime Şahindal
Fadime Sahindal
Fadime Şahindal was a Kurdish immigrant who moved to Sweden from Turkey at the age of seven. She was murdered by her father, Rahmi, in January 2002 in an "honor killing".-Life:...

 was killed by her father in 2002.

Every year in the United Kingdom (UK), officials estimate that at least a dozen women are victims of honor killings, almost exclusively within Asia
Asia
Asia is the world's largest and most populous continent, located primarily in the eastern and northern hemispheres. It covers 8.7% of the Earth's total surface area and with approximately 3.879 billion people, it hosts 60% of the world's current human population...

n and Middle East
Middle East
The Middle East is a region that encompasses Western Asia and Northern Africa. It is often used as a synonym for Near East, in opposition to Far East...

ern families. Often cases cannot be resolved due to the unwillingness of family, relatives and communities to testify. A 2006 BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...

 poll for the Asian network in the UK found that one in ten of the 500 young Asians polled said that they could condone the killing of someone who dishonored their family. In the UK, in December 2005, Nazir Afzal, Director, west London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

, of Britain's Crown Prosecution Service
Crown Prosecution Service
The Crown Prosecution Service, or CPS, is a non-ministerial department of the Government of the United Kingdom responsible for public prosecutions of people charged with criminal offences in England and Wales. Its role is similar to that of the longer-established Crown Office in Scotland, and the...

, stated that the United Kingdom has seen "at least a dozen honour killings" between 2004 and 2005. While precise figures do not exist for the perpetrators' cultural backgrounds, Diana Nammi of the UK's Iran
Iran
Iran , officially the Islamic Republic of Iran , is a country in Southern and Western Asia. The name "Iran" has been in use natively since the Sassanian era and came into use internationally in 1935, before which the country was known to the Western world as Persia...

ian and Kurd
Kürd
Kürd or Kyurd or Kyurt may refer to:*Kürd Eldarbəyli, Azerbaijan*Kürd Mahrızlı, Azerbaijan*Kürd, Goychay, Azerbaijan*Kürd, Jalilabad, Azerbaijan*Kürd, Qabala, Azerbaijan*Qurdbayram, Azerbaijan...

ish Women's Rights Organisation is reported to have said: "about two-thirds are Muslim. Yet they can also be Hindu
Hindu
Hindu refers to an identity associated with the philosophical, religious and cultural systems that are indigenous to the Indian subcontinent. As used in the Constitution of India, the word "Hindu" is also attributed to all persons professing any Indian religion...

 and Sikh
Sikh
A Sikh is a follower of Sikhism. It primarily originated in the 15th century in the Punjab region of South Asia. The term "Sikh" has its origin in Sanskrit term शिष्य , meaning "disciple, student" or शिक्ष , meaning "instruction"...

"

Another well-known case was Heshu Yones, stabbed to death by her Kurdish father in London in 2002 when her family heard a love song dedicated to her and suspected she had a boyfriend. Other examples include the killing of Tulay Goren, a Kurdish Shia Muslim girl who immigrated with her family from Turkey, and Samaira Nazir (Pakistani Muslim).

However, a lesser-known case is that of Gurmeet Singh Ubhi, a Sikh man who, in February 2011, was found guilty of the murder of his 24 year-old daughter, Amrit Kaur Ubhi in 2010. Mr. Ubhi was found to have murdered his daughter because he disapproved of her being 'too westernised'. Likewise he also disapproved of the fact that she was dating a non-Sikh man.

In 2011, in Cerignola
Cerignola
Cerignola is a town and comune of Apulia, Italy, in the province of Foggia, 40 km southeast from the town of Foggia. It has the third-largest land area of any comune in Italy, at 593.71 km², after Rome and Ravenna.-History:...

, Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

, a man stabbed his brother 19 times because his homosexuality was a «dishonour to the family».

Middle East

In 2008 a woman was killed in Saudi Arabia by her father for "chatting" to a man on Facebook
Facebook
Facebook is a social networking service and website launched in February 2004, operated and privately owned by Facebook, Inc. , Facebook has more than 800 million active users. Users must register before using the site, after which they may create a personal profile, add other users as...

. The killing became public only when a Saudi cleric referred to the case to criticise Facebook for the strife it caused.

A June 2008 report by the Turkish Prime Ministry's Human Rights Directorate said that in Istanbul
Istanbul
Istanbul , historically known as Byzantium and Constantinople , is the largest city of Turkey. Istanbul metropolitan province had 13.26 million people living in it as of December, 2010, which is 18% of Turkey's population and the 3rd largest metropolitan area in Europe after London and...

 alone there was one honor killing every week, and reported over 1,000 during the previous five years. It added that metropolitan cities were the location of many of these, due to growing Kurdish immigration to these cities from the East. In 2009 a Turkish news agency reported that a 2-day-old boy who was born out of wedlock had been killed for honor. The maternal grandmother of the infant, along with six other persons, including a doctor who had reportedly accepted a bribe to not report the birth, were arrested. The grandmother is suspected of fatally suffocating the infant. The child's mother, 25, was also arrested; she stated that her family had made the decision to kill the child.

A girl in Turkey was killed after her family heard a song and thought she had a boyfriend. In 2010 a 16-year-old girl was buried alive by relatives for befriending boys in Southeast Turkey; her corpse was found 40 days after she went missing. Ahmet Yildiz, 26, a Turkish physics student who represented his country at an international gay conference in the United States in 2008, was shot leaving a cafe in Istanbul
Istanbul
Istanbul , historically known as Byzantium and Constantinople , is the largest city of Turkey. Istanbul metropolitan province had 13.26 million people living in it as of December, 2010, which is 18% of Turkey's population and the 3rd largest metropolitan area in Europe after London and...

. It is believed Yildiz was the victim of the country's first gay honor killing.

There are no exact official numbers about honor killings of women in Lebanon
Lebanon
Lebanon , officially the Republic of LebanonRepublic of Lebanon is the most common term used by Lebanese government agencies. The term Lebanese Republic, a literal translation of the official Arabic and French names that is not used in today's world. Arabic is the most common language spoken among...

; many honor killings are arranged to look like accidents, but the figure is believed to be 40 to 50 per year. A 2007 report by Amnesty International said that the Lebanese media in 2001 reported 2–3 honor killings per month in Lebanon, although the number is believed by lawyers to be higher. On Aug 4th 2011 the Lebanese parliament agreed with a majority to abolish Article 562 which for years worked as an excuse for honor killing.

The Palestinian Authority, using a clause in the Jordanian penal code still in effect in the West Bank
West Bank
The West Bank ) of the Jordan River is the landlocked geographical eastern part of the Palestinian territories located in Western Asia. To the west, north, and south, the West Bank shares borders with the state of Israel. To the east, across the Jordan River, lies the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan...

, exempts men from punishment for killing a female relative if she has brought dishonor to the family. Mahmoud Abbas
Mahmoud Abbas
Mahmoud Abbas , also known by the kunya Abu Mazen , has been the Chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organisation since 11 November 2004 and became President of the Palestinian National Authority on 15 January 2005 on the Fatah ticket.Elected to serve until 9 January 2009, he unilaterally...

, President of the Palestinian Authority, promised to change the discriminatory law, but no action has been taken. According to UNICEF, in 2000 two-thirds of all killings in the Palestinian territories were honor killings.

As many as 133 women were killed in the Iraqi city of Basra
Basra
Basra is the capital of Basra Governorate, in southern Iraq near Kuwait and Iran. It had an estimated population of two million as of 2009...

 alone in 2006—79 for violation of "Islamic teachings" and 47 for honor killings, according to IRIN, the news branch of the U.N.'s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Amnesty International says that armed groups, not the government, also kill politically active women and those who did not follow a strict dress code, as well as women who are perceived as human rights defenders.

Jordan, considered one of the most liberal countries in the Middle East, still has instances of honor killings. In Jordan there is relatively little sex discrimination compared to other most other countries in the region, and women are permitted to vote, but men receive reduced sentences for killing their wives or female family members if they have brought dishonor to their family. Families often get sons under the age of 18—legally minors
Minor (law)
In law, a minor is a person under a certain age — the age of majority — which legally demarcates childhood from adulthood; the age depends upon jurisdiction and application, but is typically 18...

—to commit honor killings; the juvenile law allows convicted minors to serve time in a juvenile detention center and be released with a clean criminal record at the age of 18. Rana Husseini, a leading journalist on the topic of honor killings, states that “under the existing law, people found guilty of committing honor killings often receive sentences as light as six months in prison”.

There has been public support in Jordan to amend Articles 340 and 98. In 1999 King Abdullah
Abdullah II of Jordan
Abdullah II ibn al-Hussein is the reigning King of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. He ascended the throne on 7 February 1999 after the death of his father King Hussein. King Abdullah, whose mother is Princess Muna al-Hussein, is a member of the Hashemite family...

 created a council to review the sex inequalities in the country. The Council returned with a recommendation to repeal Article 340. “[T]he cabinet approved the recommendation, the measure was presented to parliament twice in November 1999 and January 2000 and in both cases, though approved by the upper house, it failed to pass the elected lower house”. In 2001, after parliament was suspended, a number of temporary laws were created which were subject to parliamentary ratification. One of the amendments was that “husbands would no longer be exonerated for killing unfaithful wives, but instead the circumstances would be considered as evidence for mitigating punishments”. In the interest of sex equality, women were given the same reduction in punishment if found guilty of the crime. But parliament returned to session in 2003 and the new amendments were rejected by the lower house after two successful readings in the upper house.

Canada

A 2007 study by Dr. Amin Muhammad and Dr. Sujay Patel of Memorial University, Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

, investigated how the practice of honor killings has been brought to Canada. The report explained that "[w]hen people come and settle in Canada they can bring their traditions and forcefully follow them. In some cultures, people feel some boundaries are never to be crossed, and if someone would violate those practices or go against it, then killing is justified to them." The report noted that "In different cultures, they can get away without being punished—the courts actually sanction them under religious contexts". The report also said that the people who commit these crimes are usually mentally ill, and that the mental health aspect is often ignored by Western observers because of a lack of understanding of the insufficiently developed state of mental healthcare in developing countries in which honor killings are prevalent.

United States

A 2009 study by Phyllis Chesler in Middle East Quarterly
Middle East Quarterly
Middle East Quarterly is a peer reviewed quarterly journal, a publication of the American conservative think tank Middle East Forum founded by Daniel Pipes in 1994. It is devoted to subjects relating to the Middle East and Islam and analyzes the region "explicitly from the viewpoint of American...

argues that the United States is far behind Europe in acknowledging that honor killings are a special form of domestic violence, requiring special training and special programs to protect the young women and girls most likely to be the victim of such practices. The article suggests that the fear of being labeled "culturally insensitive
Political correctness
Political correctness is a term which denotes language, ideas, policies, and behavior seen as seeking to minimize social and institutional offense in occupational, gender, racial, cultural, sexual orientation, certain other religions, beliefs or ideologies, disability, and age-related contexts,...

" often prevents government officials in the United States and the media from identifying and accurately reporting these incidents as "honor killings" when they occur. Failing to accurately describe the problem makes it more difficult to develop public policies to address it.
The article also suggests that, although there are not many cases of honor killings within the United States, ninety percent of documented honor killings in Europe and the United States featured killers who were Muslim, and most of the murders were Muslims killing other Muslims. . For these documented cases in North America and Europe also, the victim was murdered because they were believed to have acted in a way against the religion of the family.

Latin America

In Latin America
Latin America
Latin America is a region of the Americas where Romance languages  – particularly Spanish and Portuguese, and variably French – are primarily spoken. Latin America has an area of approximately 21,069,500 km² , almost 3.9% of the Earth's surface or 14.1% of its land surface area...

, honor killings are sometimes referred to as dowry deaths and bride burnings. Crimes of passion within Latin America have also been compared to honor killings. Similar to honor killings, crimes of passion often feature the murder of women by a husband, family member, or boyfriends and the crime is often condoned or sanctioned. In the country of Peru, for example, 70 percent of the murders of women in one year, was committed by a husband, boyfriend or lover, and most often jealousy or suspicions of infidelity are cited as the reasons for the murders.

Pakistan

Main article: Honor killing in Pakistan

In Pakistan
Pakistan
Pakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...

 honor killings are known locally as karo-kari
Karo-kari
In Pakistan honor killings are known locally as karo-kari . Karo-kari is part of cultural tradition in Sindh and is a compound word literally meaning "black male" and "black female , in metaphoric terms for adulterer and adulteress...

. An Amnesty International report noted "the failure of the authorities to prevent these killings by investigating and punishing the perpetrators." Recent cases include that of three teenage girls who were buried alive after refusing arranged marriages. Another case was that of Taslim Khatoon Solangi, 17, of Hajna Shah village in Khairpur district, which was widely reported after her father, 57-year-old Gul Sher Solangi, publicized the case. He alleged his eight-months-pregnant daughter was tortured and killed on March 7 on the orders of her father-in-law, who accused her of carrying a child conceived out of wedlock. Statistically, honor killings have a high level of support in Pakistan's rural society, despite widespread condemnation from human rights groups. In 2002 alone over 382 people, about 245 women and 137 men, became victims of honor killings in the Sindh
Sindh
Sindh historically referred to as Ba'ab-ul-Islam , is one of the four provinces of Pakistan and historically is home to the Sindhi people. It is also locally known as the "Mehran". Though Muslims form the largest religious group in Sindh, a good number of Christians, Zoroastrians and Hindus can...

 province of Pakistan
Pakistan
Pakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...

. Over the course of six years, more than 4,000 women have died as victims of honor killings in Pakistan from 1999 to 2004. In 2005 the average annual number of honor killings for the whole nation was stated to be more than 10,000 per year.
According to women's rights advocates, the concepts of women as property, and of honor, are so deeply entrenched in the social, political and economic fabric of Pakistan that the government mostly ignores the regular occurrences of women being killed and maimed by their families." Frequently, women killed in honor killings are recorded as having committed suicide or died in accidents.

A conference held in May 2005 in Islamabad
Islamabad
Islamabad is the capital of Pakistan and the tenth largest city in the country. Located within the Islamabad Capital Territory , the population of the city has grown from 100,000 in 1951 to 1.7 million in 2011...

 addressed whether Pakistani law, governments and international agencies were having any success in reducing honor killings in the country. They found that more cases of honor killing are being reported rather than hidden, and more women are having the courage to come forward. But they found there was a severe lack of proper implementation of laws and assurances that men who commit honor killings are not given lighter sentences. The conference found fault with Pakistan's Zina laws that put women in an unfair disadvantage and inferior position, often at the mercy of men to prove their innocence.

It is noted by sociologists that honor killings do not necessarily have to do with religion, but rather the cultures in different regions. Savitri Goonesekere
Savitri Goonesekere
Savitri Goonesekere is a jurist and academic from Sri Lanka. She is an international expert on the rights of children. A prolific writer, Goonasekere was instrumental in the evolution of modern legal education in Sri Lanka...

 qualifies this claim, saying that Islamic leaders
Imam
An imam is an Islamic leadership position, often the worship leader of a mosque and the Muslim community. Similar to spiritual leaders, the imam is the one who leads Islamic worship services. More often, the community turns to the mosque imam if they have a religious question...

 in Pakistan use religious justifications for sanctioning honor killings.

India

Honor killings have been reported in northern regions of India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

, mainly in the Indian states of Uttarakhand
Uttarakhand
Uttarakhand , formerly Uttaranchal, is a state in the northern part of India. It is often referred to as the Land of Gods due to the many holy Hindu temples and cities found throughout the state, some of which are among Hinduism's most spiritual and auspicious places of pilgrimage and worship...

, Punjab, Rajasthan
Rajasthan
Rājasthān the land of Rajasthanis, , is the largest state of the Republic of India by area. It is located in the northwest of India. It encompasses most of the area of the large, inhospitable Great Indian Desert , which has an edge paralleling the Sutlej-Indus river valley along its border with...

, Haryana
Haryana
Haryana is a state in India. Historically, it has been a part of the Kuru region in North India. The name Haryana is found mentioned in the 12th century AD by the apabhramsha writer Vibudh Shridhar . It is bordered by Punjab and Himachal Pradesh to the north, and by Rajasthan to the west and south...

, Uttar Pradesh
Uttar Pradesh
Uttar Pradesh abbreviation U.P. , is a state located in the northern part of India. With a population of over 200 million people, it is India's most populous state, as well as the world's most populous sub-national entity...

 and Bihar
Bihar
Bihar is a state in eastern India. It is the 12th largest state in terms of geographical size at and 3rd largest by population. Almost 58% of Biharis are below the age of 25, which is the highest proportion in India....

, as a result of people marrying without their family's acceptance, and sometimes for marrying outside their caste
Caste system in India
The Indian caste system is a system of social stratification and social restriction in India in which communities are defined by thousands of endogamous hereditary groups called Jātis....

 or religion. In contrast, honor killings are rare to non-existent in South India
South India
South India is the area encompassing India's states of Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala and Tamil Nadu as well as the union territories of Lakshadweep and Pondicherry, occupying 19.31% of India's area...

 and the western Indian states of Maharashtra
Maharashtra
Maharashtra is a state located in India. It is the second most populous after Uttar Pradesh and third largest state by area in India...

 and Gujarat. In some other parts of India, notably West Bengal
West Bengal
West Bengal is a state in the eastern region of India and is the nation's fourth-most populous. It is also the seventh-most populous sub-national entity in the world, with over 91 million inhabitants. A major agricultural producer, West Bengal is the sixth-largest contributor to India's GDP...

, honor killings ceased about a century ago, largely due to the activism and influence of reformists
Hindu reform movements
Several contemporary groups, collectively termed Hindu reform movements, strive to introduce regeneration and reform to Hinduism. Although these movements are very individual in their exact philosophies they generally stress the spiritual, secular and logical and scientific aspects of the Vedic...

 such as Vivekananda, Ramakrishna
Ramakrishna
Ramakrishna , born Gadadhar Chattopadhyay , was a famous mystic of 19th-century India. His religious school of thought led to the formation of the Ramakrishna Mission by his chief disciple Swami Vivekananda – both were influential figures in the Bengali Renaissance as well as the Hindu...

, Vidyasagar
Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar
Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar CIE , born Ishwar Chandra Bandopadhyaya , was an Indian Bengali polymath and a key figure of the Bengal Renaissance....

 and Raja Ram Mohan Roy.

Among Rajput
Rajput
A Rajput is a member of one of the patrilineal clans of western, central, northern India and in some parts of Pakistan. Rajputs are descendants of one of the major ruling warrior classes in the Indian subcontinent, particularly North India...

s, marriages with members of other castes can provoke the killing of the married couple and immediate family members. This form of honor killing is attributed to Rajput culture
Culture
Culture is a term that has many different inter-related meanings. For example, in 1952, Alfred Kroeber and Clyde Kluckhohn compiled a list of 164 definitions of "culture" in Culture: A Critical Review of Concepts and Definitions...

 and traditional views on the perceived "purity" of a lineage.

The Indian state of Punjab has a large number of honor killings. According to data compiled by the Punjab Police, 34 honor killings were reported in the state between 2008 and 2010: 10 in 2008, 20 in 2009, and four in 2010 .

Haryana
Haryana
Haryana is a state in India. Historically, it has been a part of the Kuru region in North India. The name Haryana is found mentioned in the 12th century AD by the apabhramsha writer Vibudh Shridhar . It is bordered by Punjab and Himachal Pradesh to the north, and by Rajasthan to the west and south...

 and Uttarakhand
Uttarakhand
Uttarakhand , formerly Uttaranchal, is a state in the northern part of India. It is often referred to as the Land of Gods due to the many holy Hindu temples and cities found throughout the state, some of which are among Hinduism's most spiritual and auspicious places of pilgrimage and worship...

 are also notoriously known for incidents of honor killing which is mainly happens in the upper cast of society mainly rajputs and jaats. Bhagalpur
Bhagalpur
Bhagdattpuram was one of the most influential towns in "Aryavarta" . It is supposed to have been concurrent to Patliputra or Patna. Bhagdattpuram finds its mention in the Vedas and Ramayana as well. It is supposed to be the kingdom of Daanvir Karna, the son of Kunti and the Sun God...

 in the northern Indian state of Bihar
Bihar
Bihar is a state in eastern India. It is the 12th largest state in terms of geographical size at and 3rd largest by population. Almost 58% of Biharis are below the age of 25, which is the highest proportion in India....

 has also been notorious for honor killings. Recent cases include a 16-year-old girl, Imrana, from Bhojpur
Bhojpur
Bhojpur may refer to:India* Bhojpur district, Bihar* Bhojpur, Madhya Pradesh* Bhojpur, Orissa* Bhojpur Dharampur, a town and a nagar panchayat in Moradabad district of Uttar PradeshNepal* Bhojpur District, Nepal, a part of Kosi Zone...

 who was set on fire inside her house in a case of what the police called ‘moral vigilantism’. The victim had screamed for help for about 20 minutes before neighbours arrived, only to find her still smoldering. She was admitted to a local hospital, where she later died from her injuries. In May 2008, Jayvirsingh Bhadodiya shot his daughter Vandana Bhadodiya and struck her on the head with an axe. In June 2010 some incidents were reported even from Delhi
Delhi
Delhi , officially National Capital Territory of Delhi , is the largest metropolis by area and the second-largest by population in India, next to Mumbai. It is the eighth largest metropolis in the world by population with 16,753,265 inhabitants in the Territory at the 2011 Census...

.

In a landmark judgment in March 2010, Karnal
Karnal
Karnal is an important city and the headquarters of Karnal District in the Indian state of Haryana.Karnal is said to have been founded by the Kauravas in the Mahabharata era for the king Karna, a mythological hero and a key figure in the epic tale...

 district court ordered the execution of the five perpetrators of an honor killing
Kaithal honour killing case
The Manoj-Babli honour killing case was the honour killing of Indian newly-weds Manoj Banwala and Babli in June 2007 and the successive court case which historically convicted defendants for an honor killing...

 in Kaithal
Kaithal
Kaithal is a city and a municipal council in Kaithal district in the Indian state of Haryana. Kaithal was previously a part of Karnal District and later, Kurukshetra District until 1 November 1989, when it became the headquarters of the Kaithal District of Haryana. Kaithal shares common boundary...

, and imprisoning for life the khap (local caste-based council) head who ordered the killings of Manoj Banwala (23) and Babli (19), a man and woman of the same clan who eloped and married in June 2007. Despite having been given police protection on court orders, they were kidnapped; their mutilated bodies were found a week later in an irrigation canal.

In 1990 the National Commission for Women
National Commission for Women
The National Commission for Women is a statutory body for women established in 1992 by Government of India under the provisions of the Indian Constitution, as defined in the 1990 National Commission for Women Act.. The present head of the Commission is Mrs...

 set up a statutory body in order to address the issues of honor killings among some ethnic groups in North India. This body reviewed constitutional
Constitution of India
The Constitution of India is the supreme law of India. It lays down the framework defining fundamental political principles, establishes the structure, procedures, powers, and duties of government institutions, and sets out fundamental rights, directive principles, and the duties of citizens...

, legal
Indian law
Law of India refers to the system of law in modern India. It is largely based on English common law because of the long period of British colonial influence during the period of the British Raj. Much of contemporary Indian law shows substantial European and American influence. Various legislation...

 and other provisions as well as challenges women face. The NCW's activism has contributed significantly towards the reduction of honor killings in rural areas of North India. According to Pakistani activists Hina Jilani
Hina Jilani
Hina Jilani is an advocate of the Supreme Court of Pakistan and a human-rights activist from Lahore in Punjab, Pakistan.-Work:Jilani is internationally recognized for her expertise in critical human rights investigations. She started practising law in 1979, when Pakistan was under martial law...

 and Eman M. Ahmed, Indian women are considerably better protected against honor killings by Indian law
Indian law
Law of India refers to the system of law in modern India. It is largely based on English common law because of the long period of British colonial influence during the period of the British Raj. Much of contemporary Indian law shows substantial European and American influence. Various legislation...

 and government than Pakistani women, and they have suggested that governments of countries affected by honor killings use Indian law as a model in order to prevent honor killings in their respective societies.

In June 2010, scrutinizing the increasing number of honor killings, the Supreme Court of India
Supreme Court of India
The Supreme Court of India is the highest judicial forum and final court of appeal as established by Part V, Chapter IV of the Constitution of India...

 issued notices to the Central Government and six states including Uttar Pradesh
Uttar Pradesh
Uttar Pradesh abbreviation U.P. , is a state located in the northern part of India. With a population of over 200 million people, it is India's most populous state, as well as the world's most populous sub-national entity...

, Punjab
Punjab (India)
Punjab ) is a state in the northwest of the Republic of India, forming part of the larger Punjab region. The state is bordered by the Indian states of Himachal Pradesh to the east, Haryana to the south and southeast and Rajasthan to the southwest as well as the Pakistani province of Punjab to the...

, Haryana
Haryana
Haryana is a state in India. Historically, it has been a part of the Kuru region in North India. The name Haryana is found mentioned in the 12th century AD by the apabhramsha writer Vibudh Shridhar . It is bordered by Punjab and Himachal Pradesh to the north, and by Rajasthan to the west and south...

 and Rajasthan
Rajasthan
Rājasthān the land of Rajasthanis, , is the largest state of the Republic of India by area. It is located in the northwest of India. It encompasses most of the area of the large, inhospitable Great Indian Desert , which has an edge paralleling the Sutlej-Indus river valley along its border with...

 to take preventive measures against honor killings.

Alarmed by the rise of honor killings, the Government planned to bring a bill in the Monsoon Session of Parliament July 2010 to provide for deterrent punishment for 'honor' killings .

In national legal codes

According to the report of the United Nations Special Rapporteur submitted to the 58th session of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights
United Nations Commission on Human Rights
The United Nations Commission on Human Rights was a functional commission within the overall framework of the United Nations from 1946 until it was replaced by the United Nations Human Rights Council in 2006...

 in 2002 concerning cultural practices in the family that reflect violence against women (E/CN.4/2002/83):
The Special Rapporteur indicated that there had been contradictory decisions with regard to the honour defense in Brazil
Brazil
Brazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...

, and that legislative provisions allowing for partial or complete defense in that context could be found in the penal codes of Argentina
Argentina
Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...

, Ecuador
Ecuador
Ecuador , officially the Republic of Ecuador is a representative democratic republic in South America, bordered by Colombia on the north, Peru on the east and south, and by the Pacific Ocean to the west. It is one of only two countries in South America, along with Chile, that do not have a border...

, Egypt
Egypt
Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...

, Guatemala
Guatemala
Guatemala is a country in Central America bordered by Mexico to the north and west, the Pacific Ocean to the southwest, Belize to the northeast, the Caribbean to the east, and Honduras and El Salvador to the southeast...

, Iran
Iran
Iran , officially the Islamic Republic of Iran , is a country in Southern and Western Asia. The name "Iran" has been in use natively since the Sassanian era and came into use internationally in 1935, before which the country was known to the Western world as Persia...

, Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...

, Jordan
Jordan
Jordan , officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan , Al-Mamlaka al-Urduniyya al-Hashemiyya) is a kingdom on the East Bank of the River Jordan. The country borders Saudi Arabia to the east and south-east, Iraq to the north-east, Syria to the north and the West Bank and Israel to the west, sharing...

, Peru
Peru
Peru , officially the Republic of Peru , is a country in western South America. It is bordered on the north by Ecuador and Colombia, on the east by Brazil, on the southeast by Bolivia, on the south by Chile, and on the west by the Pacific Ocean....

, Syria
Syria
Syria , officially the Syrian Arab Republic , is a country in Western Asia, bordering Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea to the West, Turkey to the north, Iraq to the east, Jordan to the south, and Israel to the southwest....

, Venezuela
Venezuela
Venezuela , officially called the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela , is a tropical country on the northern coast of South America. It borders Colombia to the west, Guyana to the east, and Brazil to the south...

 and the Palestinian National Authority
Palestinian National Authority
The Palestinian Authority is the administrative organization established to govern parts of the West Bank and Gaza Strip...

.


Countries where the law is interpreted to allow men to kill female relatives in a premeditated effort as well as for crimes of passions, in flagrante delicto
In flagrante delicto
In flagrante delicto or sometimes simply in flagrante is a legal term used to indicate that a criminal has been caught in the act of committing an offence...

in the act of committing adultery, include:
  • Jordan
    Jordan
    Jordan , officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan , Al-Mamlaka al-Urduniyya al-Hashemiyya) is a kingdom on the East Bank of the River Jordan. The country borders Saudi Arabia to the east and south-east, Iraq to the north-east, Syria to the north and the West Bank and Israel to the west, sharing...

    : Part of article 340 of the Penal Code states that "he who discovers his wife or one of his female relatives committing adultery and kills, wounds, or injures one of them, is exempted from any penalty." This has twice been put forward for cancellation by the government, but was retained by the Lower House of the Parliament, in 2003: a year in which at least seven honor killings took place. Article 98 of the Penal Code is often cited alongside Article 340 in cases of honor killings. “Article 98 stipulates that a reduced sentence is applied to a person who kills another person in a ‘fit of fury’”.


Countries that allow men to kill female relatives in flagrante delicto (but without premeditation) include:
  • Syria
    Syria
    Syria , officially the Syrian Arab Republic , is a country in Western Asia, bordering Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea to the West, Turkey to the north, Iraq to the east, Jordan to the south, and Israel to the southwest....

    : Article 548 states that "He who catches his wife or one of his ascendants, descendants or sister committing adultery (flagrante delicto) or illegitimate sexual acts with another and he killed or injured one or both of them benefits from a reduced penalty, that should not be less than 2 years in prison in case of a killing."


Countries that allow husbands to kill only their wives in flagrante delicto (based upon the Napoleonic code
Napoleonic code
The Napoleonic Code — or Code Napoléon — is the French civil code, established under Napoléon I in 1804. The code forbade privileges based on birth, allowed freedom of religion, and specified that government jobs go to the most qualified...

) include:
  • Morocco
    Morocco
    Morocco , officially the Kingdom of Morocco , is a country located in North Africa. It has a population of more than 32 million and an area of 710,850 km², and also primarily administers the disputed region of the Western Sahara...

    : Revisions to Morocco's criminal code in 2003 helped improve women's legal status by eliminating unequal sentencing in adultery cases. Article 418 of the penal code granted extenuating circumstances to a husband who kills, injures, or beats his wife and/or her partner, when catching them in flagrante delicto while committing adultery. While this article has not been repealed, the penalty for committing this crime is at least now the same for both genders.

  • In two Latin America
    Latin America
    Latin America is a region of the Americas where Romance languages  – particularly Spanish and Portuguese, and variably French – are primarily spoken. Latin America has an area of approximately 21,069,500 km² , almost 3.9% of the Earth's surface or 14.1% of its land surface area...

    n countries, similar laws were struck down over the past two decades: according to human rights lawyer Julie Mertus "in Brazil
    Brazil
    Brazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...

    , until 1991 wife killings were considered to be non-criminal 'honor killings'; in just one year, nearly eight hundred husbands killed their wives. Similarly, in Colombia
    Colombia
    Colombia, officially the Republic of Colombia , is a unitary constitutional republic comprising thirty-two departments. The country is located in northwestern South America, bordered to the east by Venezuela and Brazil; to the south by Ecuador and Peru; to the north by the Caribbean Sea; to the...

    , until 1980, a husband legally could kill his wife for committing adultery."


Countries where honor killing is not legal but is known to occur include:
  • Turkey
    Turkey
    Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...

    : In Turkey, persons found guilty of this crime are sentenced to life in prison. There are well documented cases, where Turkish courts have sentenced whole families to life imprisonment for an honor killing. The most recent was on January 13, 2009, where a Turkish Court sentenced five members of the same Kurdish family to life imprisonment for the honor killing of Naile Erdas, 16, who got pregnant as a result of rape.

  • Pakistan
    Pakistan
    Pakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...

    : Honor killings are known as karo kari . The practice is supposed to be prosecuted under ordinary killing, but in practice police and prosecutors often ignore it. Often a man must simply claim the killing was for his honor and he will go free. Nilofar Bakhtiar
    Nilofar Bakhtiar
    Nilofar Bakhtiar is a public official in Pakistan. She was Federal Minister for Tourism in Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz's cabinet until a scandal forced her to resign. She remains a senator. Bakhtiar has worked toward improving women's social status, as well as working in areas of health and...

    , advisor to Prime Minister
    Prime Minister of Pakistan
    The Prime Minister of Pakistan , is the Head of Government of Pakistan who is designated to exercise as the country's Chief Executive. By the Constitution of Pakistan, Pakistan has the parliamentary democratic system of government...

     Shaukat Aziz
    Shaukat Aziz
    Shaukat Aziz is a world acclaimed Pakistani economist who was the 15th Prime Minister of Pakistan from May 20, 2004 to 15 November 2007 in a joint military government led by General Pervez Musharraf. A Citibank executive, Aziz returned to Pakistan from the United States to be became Finance...

    , stated that in 2003, as many as 1,261 women were killed in honor killings. On December 8, 2004, under international and domestic pressure, Pakistan enacted a law that made honor killings punishable by a prison term of seven years, or by the death penalty in the most extreme cases. Women's rights organizations were, however, wary of this law as it stops short of outlawing the practice of allowing killers to buy their freedom by paying compensation to the victim's relatives. Women's rights groups claimed that in most cases it is the victim's immediate relatives who are the killers, so inherently the new law is just whitewash. It did not alter the provisions whereby the accused could negotiate pardon with the victim's family under the Islamic provisions. In March 2005 the Pakistani parliament rejected a bill which sought to strengthen the law against the practice of honor killing. However, the bill was brought up again, and in November 2006, it passed. It is doubtful whether or not the law would actually help women.

  • Egypt
    Egypt
    Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...

    : A number of studies on honor crimes by The Centre of Islamic and Middle Eastern Law, at the School of Oriental and African Studies
    School of Oriental and African Studies
    The School of Oriental and African Studies is a public research university located in London, United Kingdom and a constituent college of the University of London...

     in London, includes one which reports on Egypt's legal system, noting a gender bias in favor of men in general, and notably article 17 of the Penal Code: judicial discretion to allow reduced punishment in certain circumstance, often used in honor killings case.

Support and sanction

Actions of Pakistani police officers and judge have, in the past, seemed to support the act of honor killings in the name of family honor. Police enforcement, in situations of admitted murder, do not always take action against the perpetrator. Also, judges in Pakistan, rather than ruling cases with gender equality in mind, also seem to reinforce inequality and in some cases sanction the murder of women considered dishonorable.

Kremlin-appointed Chechen President
President of the Chechen Republic
The President of the Chechen Republic, known commonly as the President of Chechnya, is the highest office within the Government of Chechnya. The office was instituted in 2003 during the course of the Second Chechen War, when the Russian federal government regained control over the...

 Ramzan Kadyrov
Ramzan Kadyrov
Ramzan Akhmadovich Kadyrov is the President of Chechnya and a former Chechen rebel.Ramzan is a son of former Chechen President Akhmad Kadyrov, assassinated in May 2004. In February 2007 Kadyrov replaced Alu Alkhanov as President, shortly after he had turned 30, which is the minimum age for the post...

 said that honor killings were perpetrated on those who deserved to die. He said that those who are killed have "loose morals" and are rightfully shot by relatives in honor killings. He did not vilify women alone but added that "If a woman runs around and if a man runs around with her, both of them are killed."

In 2007, a famous Norwegian Supreme Court advocate stated that he wanted the punishment for the killing from 17 years in prison to 15 years in the case of honor killings practiced in Norway
Norway
Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...

. He stated that the Norwegian public did not understand other cultures who practiced honor killings, or understand their thinking, and that Norwegian culture "is self-righteous".

In 2008, Israr Ullah Zehri
Israr Ullah Zehri
Nawabzada Mir Israr Ullah Khan Zehri is currently Pakistan's Federal Minister for Postal Services. He hails from Jhalawan, Balochistan and is president of Balochistan National Party Awami...

, a Pakistan
Pakistan
Pakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...

i politician in Balochistan
Balochistan
Balochistan or Baluchistan is a region which covers parts of Afghanistan, Iran and Pakistan. It can also refer to one of several modern and historical territories within that region:...

, defended the honor killings of five women belonging to the Umrani
Umrani
The 'Umrani' is a Baloch tribe, originating in the Pakistani provinces of Balochistan and Sindh. Umrani tribe is mostly settled in Nasirabad District and Jafarabad District, the southeastern districts of Balochistan, but some of them also settled in Kalat District, Khuzdar District and Awaran...

 tribe by a relative of a local Umrani politician. Zehri defended the killings in Parliament and asked his fellow legislators not to make a fuss about the incident. He said, "These are centuries-old traditions, and I will continue to defend them. Only those who indulge in immoral acts should be afraid."

Nilofar Bakhtiar, Minister for Tourism and Advisor to Pakistan Prime Minister on Women's Affairs, who had struggled against the honor killing in Pakistan, resigned in April 2007 after the clerics accused her of bringing shame to Pakistan by para-jumping with a male and hugging him after landing.

See also

  • Corrective rape
    Corrective rape
    Corrective rape is a criminal practice first seen in South Africa, whereby lesbian women are raped by men, sometimes under supervision by members of their families or local communities, purportedly as a means of "curing" them of their homosexuality....

  • Crime of passion
    Crime of passion
    A crime of passion, or crime passionnel, in popular usage, refers to a crime in which the perpetrator commits a crime, especially assault or murder, against someone because of sudden strong impulse such as sudden rage or heartbreak rather than as a premeditated crime...

  • Namus
    Namus
    Namus is the Arabic word of a concept of an ethical category, a virtue, in Middle Eastern patriarchal character...

  • Extramarital sex
    Extramarital sex
    Extramarital sex occurs when a married person engages in sexual activity with someone other than his or her marriage partner.Where extramarital sexual relations breach a sexual norm it may also be referred to as adultery, fornication, philandery, or infidelity...

  • Shame society
    Shame society
    In cultural anthropology, a shame society is the concept that, in a given society, the primary device for gaining control over children and maintaining social order is the inculcation of shame and the complementary threat of ostracism...

  • Honor suicide
    Honor suicide
    Honor suicide can mean:* Honor suicide, a form of suicide motivated by personal honor* Forced suicide, a form of honor killing in which the victim is pressured into committing suicide...

  • Chronicle of a Death Foretold
    Chronicle of a Death Foretold
    Chronicle of a Death Foretold is a novella by Gabriel García Márquez, published in 1981...

  • Violence against LGBT people
  • Crime against humanity
    Crime against humanity
    Crimes against humanity, as defined by the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court Explanatory Memorandum, "are particularly odious offenses in that they constitute a serious attack on human dignity or grave humiliation or a degradation of one or more human beings...


Victims

  • Du’a Khalil Aswad
  • Anooshe Sediq Ghulam
    Anooshe Sediq Ghulam
    Anooshe Sediq Ghulam, a 22-year-old Afghan refugee in Norway who was killed by her husband, Afghani Nasruddin Shamsi, in an "honor killing".Anooshe had been abused by her husband and, with the help of the Norwegian social services, had divorced him and left him while taking the couple's two...

  • Leila Hussein
    Leila Hussein
    Leila Hussein was an Iraqi woman living in Basra who came to public attention in March 2008, when her husband killed their teenage daughter — reportedly with the approval of local police — because she had formed a friendship with a British soldier stationed in the city...

     and her daughter Rand Abdel-Qader
  • Ghazala Khan
    Ghazala Khan
    Ghazala Khan was a Pakistani woman, who was shot and killed in Denmark by her brother after she had married against the will of the family. The murder of Ghazala had been ordered by her father to save the family honour, making it a so‐called honour killing...

  • Samaira Nazir
    Samaira Nazir
    Samaira Nazir was a 25-year-old British Pakistani woman who was murdered by her family members. She was a victim of honor killing....

  • Aqsa Parvez
    Aqsa Parvez
    Aqsa "Axa" Parvez was the victim of an honour killing in Mississauga, Ontario, Canada. During the murder trial, Superior Court Justice Bruce Durno acknowledged the slaying as an honour killing, stating, "that he found it "profoundly disturbing that a 16-year-old could be murdered by a father and...

  • Fadime Sahindal
    Fadime Sahindal
    Fadime Şahindal was a Kurdish immigrant who moved to Sweden from Turkey at the age of seven. She was murdered by her father, Rahmi, in January 2002 in an "honor killing".-Life:...

  • Jaswinder Kaur Sidhu
    Jaswinder Kaur Sidhu
    Jaswinder Kaur Sidhu, also known as Jassi was a Sikh beautician in Maple Ridge, British Columbia, Canada, who was the victim of an honor killing...

  • Hatun Sürücü
    Hatun Sürücü
    Hatun "Aynur" Sürücü was a Kurdish woman living in Germany whose family was originally from Erzurum, Turkey. She was murdered at the age of 23 in Berlin, by her own youngest brother, in an honor killing...

  • Arash Ghorbani-Zarin
    Arash Ghorbani-Zarin
    Arash Ghorbani-Zarin was an Iranian student at Oxford Brookes University who was murdered by the brothers of his girlfriend, Manna Begum in a case of honour killing. His body was discovered in a car in Rose Hill, Oxfordshire, on November 20, 2004. He had been stabbed 46 times...

  • Samia Sarwar
    Samia Sarwar
    Samia Sarwar was a Pakistani woman, who was shot dead in her lawyers' office in Lahore in an "honor killing". The murder was arranged by her mother, father and aunt - because of the shame they felt in her attempt to leave her children and elope with another man while seeking divorce from her...

  • Manoj and Babli
    Kaithal honour killing case
    The Manoj-Babli honour killing case was the honour killing of Indian newly-weds Manoj Banwala and Babli in June 2007 and the successive court case which historically convicted defendants for an honor killing...

  • Noor Faleh Almaleki
  • Amina and Sarah Said
  • Sandeela Kanwal
  • Aasiya Zubair
    Aasiya Zubair
    Aasiya Zubair, also known as Aasiya Hassan was with her husband Muzzammil Hassan, the founder and owner of Bridges TV, the first American Muslim English-language television network...


Further reading

  • Burke, Jason. The Guardian
    The Guardian
    The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...

    . Triple murder in India highlights increase in 'honour killings'. 25 June 2010.
  • Chesler, Phyllis
    Phyllis Chesler
    Phyllis Chesler is an American writer, psychotherapist, and professor emerita of psychology and women's studies at the College of Staten Island...

    , 2009, "Are Honor Killings Simply Domestic Violence?" Middle East Quarterly XVI(2): 61–69.
  • Emery, James. Reputation is Everything: Honor Killing among the Palestinians. 2003.
  • "Jordan Parliament Supports Impunity for Honor Killing," Washington, D.C.
    Washington, D.C.
    Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....

    : Human Rights Watch
    Human Rights Watch
    Human Rights Watch is an international non-governmental organization that conducts research and advocacy on human rights. Its headquarters are in New York City and it has offices in Berlin, Beirut, Brussels, Chicago, Geneva, Johannesburg, London, Los Angeles, Moscow, Paris, San Francisco, Tokyo,...

     news release, January 2000.
  • Burned Alive: A Victim of the Law of Men. (ISBN 0-446-53346-7) Alleged first-person account of Souad
    Souad
    Burned Alive: a Victim of the Law of Men is a best-selling book, ostensibly a first-person account of an attempted honor killing. The author, Souad, is described as a Palestinian woman now living in Europe who survived an attempted murder by her brother-in-law, who doused her with gasoline and set...

    , a victim of an attempted honor killing . The authenticity of this work has been questioned, as it is based on a repressed memory
    Repressed memory
    Repressed memory is a hypothetical concept used to describe a significant memory, usually of a traumatic nature, that has become unavailable for recall; also called motivated forgetting in which a subject blocks out painful or traumatic times in one's life...

     report.
  • Schulze, Kirsten, Martin Stokes and Colm Campbell (1996) (eds.), Nationalism, Minorities and Diasporas: Identities and Rights in the Middle East (London: I.B. Tauris)
  • Tintori, Karen, 2007. Unto the Daughters: The Legacy of an Honor Killing in a Sicilian-American Family. St. Martin's Press.
  • Wikan, Unni, 2002. Generous Betrayal: Politics of Culture in the New Europe. University of Chicago Press.
  • Yavuz, Ercan. "Honor killings a misunderstood concept, study finds." Today's Zaman. August 1, 2010.

External links

(United Nations Development Programme
United Nations Development Programme
The United Nations Development Programme is the United Nations' global development network. It advocates for change and connects countries to knowledge, experience and resources to help people build a better life. UNDP operates in 177 countries, working with nations on their own solutions to...

) that summarizes and evaluates qualitative research about honour killings.
The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
x
OK