On the morning of Saturday, July 18, , Jordanians awoke to news of a horrific murder. A man killed his daughter, Ahlam, by smashing her head with a concrete block in plain view on a public street, then sat beside her body, smoking a cigarette and drinking a cup of tea. Ahlam was not the first, and will not be the last, victim of gender-based violence in Jordan. Women in our societies will continue to be second-class citizens as long as society is silent and in denial, family protection is overlooked, and there is no law deterring such crimes.
Even the partial information available since the mids paints a very disturbing picture. Data from the Ministry of Social Development indicate that nine crimes of this kind were recorded in and six in By and , according to Ministry data, the reported number of cases was 18 and 17 for each respective year.
Other statistics suggest that 12 crimes in were committed under the pretext of honor and eight in By , Human Rights Watch estimated that between 15 and 20 honor crimes occurred annually.
In addition to the state, family members also will frequently protect the murderer , unwilling or unable to give their relative over to the authorities. The family may also rally behind the murderer, believing the honor killing has enhanced their social status in the community. Thus, the victims of honor killings oftentimes do not get justice or retribution, and the cycle of violence is allowed to continue.
Over the last decade non-governmental organizations, such as the Honour Based Violence Awareness Network HBVA , have sought to coordinate international groups working to end the scourge of honor-based violence. HBVA is a digital resource center promoting awareness of honor killings through research and documentation, enabling experts to better understand the extent of the issue.
HBVA has also created an international network of experts, activists and NGOs intent on using a collaborative approach to educate the public about and support the victims of honor killings. Honor killings continue to be an underreported and misunderstood phenomenon in many corners of the world. Victims of honor killings are subject to arbitrary fits of violence, intended to perpetuate gender inequality. This form of violence is vastly underreported, with many killings either ignored or lightly prosecuted by authority figures.
There are, however, reasons to be optimistic that honor killings in the Northern Caucasus and other parts of the world are becoming less socially acceptable. Khan said the father of one of the victims and the other victim's brother were arrested Sunday and confessed to killing the women. The leaked mobile phone video, in which the women appeared is a year old, but surfaced on social media this month, sparking the family's ire and decision to kill the women, said Khan.
The footage shows a young man kissing the two women on the lips, while a third woman laughs alongside them. The third woman's life is not believed to be in danger, Khan said. Read More. On Monday afternoon local time, police said they had arrested the year-old man in the video on the grounds of vulgarity. The tribal areas in North and South Waziristan, which borders Afghanistan, are deeply conservative and known for their strict " honor code.
In a statement, the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan HRCP said that many people who had condemned the Waziristan murders on social media had been "threatened or ridiculed," and called on the authorities to "make it clear to all that it will not tolerate any support for this heinous practice.
Honor killings in Pakistan. There are an estimated 1, honor killings each year in Pakistan, according to a report by Human Rights Watch. But there are no official statistics around them, as they often go unreported or are logged as a suicide or natural death by family members, the report adds. In October , Pakistan passed a bill that fixed a loophole that allowed killers to escape prosecution if pardoned by the victim's family.
Previously, family members who were complicit in the crime could also forgive those who had committed it.
0コメント