Shafilea Ahmed, 17, disappeared from her Cheshire home in 2003 after a trip to Pakistan where she was made to meet a chosen husband. Her response to this family pressure was to drink bleach and write defiant poems. She told people about her domestic abuse. Soon afterwards, she was found dead. Her parents and five other relatives were arrested on suspicion of kidnap but released on bail; they deny any involvement in her death. An inquest has just started.

This could be yet another unproven “honour killing”. Even if it is not, there has been a rise in such killings and cases of appalling sadism meted out to women by their loved ones, as revealed by two documentaries on BBC2 this week. It is all done in the name of “izzat” (honour), which is felt to be violated if females refuse to obey like trained dogs.

I have written about these crimes for more than two decades and have known victims of the cruel oppression within a minority of British Asian and Arab families. Things can only get better, promised New Labour in 1997. Yet violence against women has got shockingly worse, partly because each new generation of girls gets more removed from Eastern values and more fiercely independent. More depressingly, younger women do not, any more, come out collectively against the outrage.

There was a time when a dowry death or wife, sister or daughter killing got Asian women so livid we would picket the homes of the killers with placards, jeering at the men and women who supported izzat punishments. Their bloody laundry was held up for all to see; for communal people, that was death in life. We expressed rage on behalf of those who couldn’t. Proud feminists, we were undeterred by threats from the families and their thugs.

But most young Asian and Arab women today wouldn’t be seen dead picketing. Instead the sharp and bright join think-tanks or become lawyers. We have also seen the rise of apologist women’s groups – particularly “Islamic” female activism – which idolises cultural and religious values, however heinous. Meanwhile, organisations such as the Muslim Council of Britain keep to traditional lines and never protect women’s rights.

It really is time for Asian and Arab women who have a voice and conscience to take direct action, name and shame murderous families and communities. And yes, I would join them, with my old placard, still in the shed, last used in 1984.

Lily Gupta 

So said the Home Office minister Mike O’Brien in 1999 when talking about forced marriages. Today, at the beginning of 2008, the same statement can be applied to the condition of women’s lives, and the lack of human rights that they experience.

Take the case of Shafilea Ahmed. The 17-year-old had experienced domestic violence at home, and had voiced concerns to friends and professionals that she may be forced into marriage, an inquest heard yesterday. She went missing and was discovered dead by a Cumbrian river in 2004. At the time of her disappearance, a teacher who had overheard her siblings talking reported her missing. Yesterday, at the inquest into Shafilea’s death, Detective Superintendent Geraint Jones spoke of how she had told several people that she was “frightened of being forced into marriage”.

In her speech at Chatham House in October, Cherie Booth QC delivered a powerful discourse about women’s human rights in the 21st century, and in particular the “twin distortions of culture and religion”. Later, I asked Ms Booth how she thought religious and cultural traditions could be challenged bearing in mind issues of cultural sensitivity. She acknowledged that it was hard to change culture from the outside but felt that international pressure and disapproval had some effect. She also said, “We should not underestimate the value of practical and moral support and friendship to the brave people struggling against the odds in various parts of the world.”

I am not sure that is enough.

At a conference on forced marriage in London last year, the Forced Marriage Unit highlighted some of the horrors, which include kidnapping, violence, rape and even murder, experienced by the victims and survivors of forced marriages. It is true that men as well as women are forced into marriage, but undoubtedly, it is women who are most often the victims. It is also generally women that are victims of so-called honour killings.

The increase in the numbers of forced marriages and “honour killings” is mirrored in the growing numbers of young British men from various ethnic minorities that are involved in forcing a woman to marry against her will, or are involved in the crime of “honour” killing (forcing someone to marry is not a criminal act!). A BBC survey carried out in 2006 found that 1 in 10 young Asians said that they could justify the murder of someone who supposedly dishonoured their family.

Nazir Afzal OBE from the Crown Prosecution Service is a leading criminal lawyer in the field of so-called honour crimes. He highlighted the problem of young men’s attitude towards women by quoting a young man he had met in a focus group addressing violence in the Asian community. The young man explained he would go to great lengths to defend his family’s honour, and that honour revolved around the women in his family. Asked why women were so important to honour he said, “man is a piece of gold, and woman is a piece of silver. If gold falls in the dirt, you can wipe it clean. When silver falls to the ground, it is dirtied.”

Rather like the “home-grown terrorist” phenomenon, it is shocking to think that that a young man who has gone through the British education system, and lived in British society, could hold such views, or be involved in the murder or abduction of his sister. How do you challenge such deep disregard for one-half of the world’s population?

I want to say that the world is generally sexist, but I am finding it hard. I fear that most women live in a misogynist world where they are seen as a liability or their bodies are a battlefield for warring men. Look at Darfur, Pakistan, India or gang wars in the UK or the US, for example. This misogyny is so established in our collective cultural psyche that some women, maybe out of their own need to survive, have become part of the oppressive system – instilling in both female and male children the ideology that girls are worth less than boys.

I think that Cherie Booth is right to some extent. Change sometimes has to come from outside. It is through education, and particularly the education of children, that the change will come. Human rights and women’s rights should be taught at school. Single-sex religious schools should be challenged on their curriculum – looking in particular at what they teach the young about their gender roles in society. Often, religious schools – single sex or mixed – are problematic in that indoctrination (usually of girls) starts at a young age.

All countries need to start educating their citizens from a young age. When children are being taught in schools about right and wrong, or citizenship, they should be taught about what makes up the human rights act and the rights of women.

Agencies such as social workers, police and support groups cannot be afraid to intervene in what might be seen as a “cultural” matter. To quote the findings of the Victoria Climbie inquiry, “this is not an area in which there is much scope for political correctness”. Intervention from the police or social workers may have prevented the horrific deaths of Banaz Mahmod and Victoria Climbie.

The forced marriage protection order, which comes into force later this year, allows third-party intervention against a forced marriage. Social workers, teachers and women’s right groups (among others) will have the authority to ask courts to stop families forcing children and young adults into marriage in the UK and abroad. The act is an essential piece of legislation in the fight against the silent human rights abuses of women. The protection order provides a safeguard for women who do not have access to information about their rights or might not have the confidence to search for help.

If, as a country, we are truly committed to the equality of women, and to the rights of all humans, then that commitment has to filter through to all its citizens, and not just the educated articulate elite. Only then can we move from a state of confusion where women, in all strata of society and cultures, can cease to be seen as chattel.

As Nazir Afzal said: “Human rights should outweigh cultural rights every time”.

KENDAL, England — A British teenager who opposed her parents’ plan for an arranged marriage and claimed to be the victim of domestic abuse likely died from strangulation or smothering, a pathologist told an inquest into her killing Tuesday.

Shafilea Ahmed vanished in September 2003 shortly after returning home from a family trip to Pakistan, where she was introduced to a suitor and subsequently hospitalized after drinking bleach.

In February 2004, the 17-year-old student’s decomposed body was found in undergrowth near a river in Sedgwick, about 260 miles northwest of London.

Police conducted a murder investigation, but no one has been charged. An inquest — held in Britain to determine the cause of death when someone dies unexpectedly, violently or of unknown causes — was opened in March 2004. It was adjourned shortly afterward to allow the police to investigate, but reopened Tuesday at County Hall in Kendal, near where the corpse was found.

Dr. Alison Armour, the pathologist who carried out the post-mortem, ruled out death by natural causes, citing the way the body was concealed on the riverbank. There was no evidence of the body suffering trauma or fractures, she said.

“The most likely cause of death would be smothering or strangulation by ligature or manually,” Armour said in response to a question from John Bassett, representing the police. “Or an element of both.”

Poems discovered after Ahmed’s disappearance spoke of the teen’s conflict with her family and her fears she would be forced into an arranged marriage.

“Here is a girl who isn’t conforming to what this family wants,” Police Superintendent Geraint Jones told the inquest. “The next step is to carry out a murder. That was the hypothesis we followed.”

Later he said: “(The) issue is about shame and honor in the family and maybe pressure would be brought to bear within the family in that cultural environment.”

Ahmed’s parents insist they had nothing to do with her death. Iftikhar Ahmed and his wife, Farzana, were arrested on suspicion of kidnapping before their daughter’s body was discovered. Both were released without charge.

The Cheshire force only became aware of her disappearance in September 2003 after being contacted by a teacher at her former school, who heard rumors that “something had happened to her.”

Jones said he immediately feared Shafilea was dead when news of her disappearance surfaced, adding that police were aware that Shafilea had been subjected to “domestic abuse and forced marriage, potential forced marriage.”

Ahmed fled home accompanied by her boyfriend in February 2003 before her trip to the subcontinent, he said. On her return, she sought help from a volunteer group about finding her own accommodation. But Jones said she was seized by her father on the way to school and soon joined the family trip.

Several relatives from Bradford, in northern England, were arrested on suspicion of interfering with the investigation, but were not charged. Jones said they gave police misleading information about family members.

Shafilea’s parents sat in court Tuesday, showing no emotion as details of their daughter’s corpse were given to the inquest.

Iftikhar Ahmed said Shafilea was “a very normal child, very bright,” but that “problems arose” and her personality changed when she left high school for college.

Coroner Ian Smith asked if Shafilea explained why she was leaving home.

“Not directly to me,” her father responded.

The inquest, which is expected to last all week, is due to hear from Shafilea’s friends and former teachers on Wednesday.

FOX News

AMMAN (AFP) — A Jordanian man has turned himself in to police after shooting dead his 30-year-old daughter in the Jordan Valley in an apparent new “honour killing”, a security source said on Tuesday.

“The man shot his daughter several times after a quarrel as he tried to prevent her from leaving home,” the source told AFP.

“The suspect has confessed to killing his daughter because she regularly disappeared for several days.”

In November, a 33-year-old Jordanian was charged with premeditated murder for strangling his divorced sister, aged 29, for leaving home for more than a year “without permission.”

Some dozen so-called “honour killings” are reported in Jordan each year, with the killers often receiving light sentences if convicted.

Parliament has twice refused to reform the penal code despite pressure from human rights groups to end the near impunity of men who commit such killings.

These are busy times for Pakhshan Zangana. Head of the women’s caucus in the Iraqi Kurdish parliament in Arbil, she is on the verge of pushing through a piece of legislation that is the first of its kind in the Middle East — a law criminalizing female genital mutilation (FGM). “Sixty-eight out of 120 deputies signed our bill, so we could have got it passed by ministerial decree,” Zangana says. “But law-making is the job of parliament, and we want everybody to debate this issue openly.” The bill received its first reading on Dec. 3 and is likely to be passed by February.

So great was the taboo surrounding FGM until recently that even the Iraqi Kurdish authorities, largely supportive of campaigns against it, have sometimes been tentative in their resolve to take action. Since 14,000 people signed an April 2007 petition for a law against FGM, though, the mood has changed radically. Both the region’s main parties have given their blessing to the law, and FGM is now openly discussed by the local media. Back in parliament, Pakhshan Zangana knows the law represents only the end of the beginning of this struggle. Her aim now, she says, is to end FGM in Iraqi Kurdistan within five years. “A law on its own can’t do that,” Zangana says. “What can is full cooperation between government departments, and people like me, in parliament, making sure the law is enforced.”

Time 

At least 1,317 women were victimised in the previous year in various incidents of violence across the country, while 101 women were victimised in the month of December alone, including former prime minister Benazir Bhutto. The highest number of deaths occurred on the pretext of Karo-kari (honour killing) in which 210 women and 117 men were murdered by their close relatives, according to an Aurat Foundation report released Saturday.

The data was collected and compiled by Lala Hassan and Hina Tabassum. More than four people were murdered daily in Sindh during the twelve months of 2007 and despite the ban on jirgas by the Sindh High Court (SHC) Sukkur Bench, they functioned with full force in tribal areas of the country after the removal of Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry, who had been taking suo motu notice of cases of violence against women. The report also said that at least 95 Jirgas were held by local influential people, including ministers, advisors and nazims. Two women were declared ‘Garhiyo’ (not involved in illicit relations) by these jirgas.

“The newly made Women Protection Act has failed to provide safety to women fell victim to honour killings and other criminal acts,” said the report. In Indus valley (Sindh) women and minor girls were gang-raped and murdered in several incidents of violence.

At least four women, including minor girls, were raped and murdered, 45 were gang-raped, 55 were raped and attempts of rapes were made on 47 women. At least 168 women were kidnapped, and more than 130 women committed suicide owing to unemployment, forced marriages, domestic conflicts, matrimonial disputes, poverty, underage marriages and early marriages. Also, 31 women were sold and 68 women went missing and at least eight incidents of acid burns were reported during 2007.

State violence also continued against women and at least 181 women were arrested under different minor allegations or as compensation of male accused and 71 women were physically tortured by the police in the province. The report also revealed that more than 200 couples got married through courts, some of whom were later arrested by the police.

The News International

A man from the Tel Aviv area was sentenced yesterday in Tel Aviv District Court to 15 years in prison for killing his sister two years ago, in what is known as an “honor killing,” perpetrated to “uphold the family’s honor.” Walid al-Ubeid drove another brother, Khaled, to Herzl Street in Tel Aviv where they found the sister standing at a bus stop. Khaled then stabbed his sister, and forced her into the car Walid was driving. Khaled then continued to stab the sister until she died. The two brothers then drove to Jaffa, where they threw her body into the sea. After arrest, the two said they decided their sister should die because she was a prostitute who was using drugs.

Haaretz

BAGHDAD, 2 January 2008 (IRIN) – One hundred and thirty-three women were killed last year in Basra, Iraq’s second largest city, either by religious vigilantes or as a result of so-called “honour” killings, a report said on 31 December.

IRIN

LAHORE: The first honour killing of 2008 took place in Kahna early Tuesday morning. Unidentified assailant(s) shot dead a couple that eloped.

Kahna police said Muhammad Nadeem (25) from Kasur had an affair with Nasreen (22) from Dhoop Sari village in Kahna. The couple’s families did not agree to their marriage and they ran away and married in secret.

They did not inform their families about their whereabouts and started living in a rented house in Nawab Shakoor Town, Kahna. Their neighbours heard gunshots early Tuesday morning and informed the police. The police found the couple’s bodies in their bedroom.

The police said there were no witnesses. Investigators believe the girl’s family had the couple killed.

The police have sent the bodies for autopsy and are investigating after registering a case on the complaint of Nadeem’s brother, Saleem.

Daily Times