Murder in the Name of Honour

The frequency with which so-called honour-killings appear in the news mean that there is a danger of "normalising" violence towards women.

Last week a young woman was killed by her father in Urfa (south-east of Turkey), and again, women's organisations buried her body on a cemetery for those without families.

Yasemin was one and a half months pregnant when her father took her to an empty piece of land and killed her with a single bullet. The reason: Yasemin K. does not marry the man her family wants and runs away with her boyfriend. When she returns to her family, she is not forgiven. Indeed, considered with a twisted logic, she has committed two mistakes: she has chosen another husband, and then she has left him.

Killing your daughter

Father Ibrahim C. says he feels no regret. "A girl only leaves the house she has gone to [in marriage] in her coffin", referring to the wide-spread conviction that young women have no right to return to their parents' home.

"I have saved my honour by killing Yasemin", says the father. So honour is purified by a murder.

According to the new laws, Ibrahim C will probably receive a life sentence. Meanwhile, six other members of the family have been released, although they were probably implicated in the organisation of the murder. When a Pakistani woman was killed by her family in Denmark, the whole family was sentenced.

No mercy for Birgül

A recent article in the daily "Radikal" newspaper described the case of Birgül, a young woman from Agri, in the east of Turkey. In month-long disputes, the murder of Birgül became a certainty. First her family demanded of her husband that he kill her. He said, "Give me money or kill her yourself". When they did not, he finally did kill her, on the edge of a motorway.

Birgül's husband might seem unwilling to commit the murder, but he still surrenders to the system. As for the reason for the murder: Birgül and her husband could not have children, and for years he had been pressurised by his family to take a second wife. The marriage suffered and he began beating Birgül. She had run away to her parents many times but was sent back every time....

"Reasons" for murders

There are so many "reasons" for "honour killings": wanting to marry someone the family does not like, running away with a man, gossip spread about a young woman, writing a mobile phone message to a man...these reasons are listed by men with a chilling calmness.

According to the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), every year five thousand women are murdered in the name of "honour". This of course does not include all the murders that are covered up, many of them as suicides.

"Custom" normalises the inhuman

Calling these murders "custom murders" (as they are in Turkish) or "honour killings" normalises these inhuman murders.

Saying that "honour killings" are part of a tribal order and Kurdish culture means disinformation and resignation.

According to a 2005 report of Ka-Mer, an association which has saved dozens of women from murder, the real reason for these killings is to ensure women's compliance and submission. "Thus, to look for an issue of virginity or a "forbidden relation" behind every murder is to ignore the real reasons." (ZA/EÜ/AG)