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Iraqi Kurds speak out against 'Honor'
killing of women
14.9.2007
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September 14, 2007
The Kurdistan region of Iraq is still coming to
terms with the cultural and political ramifications
of the brutal honor killing of a
17-year-old
Kurdish Yazidi girl in April. Men in her village
killed the girl because she was in love with a
Muslim boy. A video of the killing helped fuel
public outrage after it appeared on the Internet.
Human rights groups say so-called honor killings in
Iraq are all too common and not limited to any one
religious sect. VOA's reports on how one group is
using the controversy in an attempt to educate the
public and change the culture.
An outdoor art exhibit in the Kurdish city and the
capital of Kurdistan of Erbil displays the
instruments typically used in honor killings. These
are acts in which women are killed by their husbands
or other men in the community for perceived moral
transgressions. There is a knife like the one used
by a man who reportedly stabbed his 19-year-old
sister, a kerosene stove that activists say is often
used to burn women to death and cinder blocks like
those used in the most infamous honor killing in the
Kurdish region of Iraq. |
Chilura Hardi, organizer |
In April, men from the Yazidi sect, a religious
minority in Northern Iraq, used cell phone cameras
to record the killing of Do'a Khalil. The footage
that appeared on the Internet shows men crushing her
skull with cinder blocks. The scenes are too graphic
for VOA to broadcast.
The art exhibit organizer Chilura Hardi is trying to
sustain the public outrage that followed Do'a
Khalil's death and change a culture that condones
violence against women. "It's OK to raise awareness
about it. Why these things are happening in the
past? This is a different day and maybe we should
look at changing these kinds of things."
Chilura Hardi heads a Kurdish women's center in
Erbil. She says the problem of honor killings
permeates all ethnic and religious groups in Iraq.
Her organization produces a magazine and operates a
call-in radio station by and for women that tries to
raise awareness about these issues. But she says
reaching Muslim men is more challenging.
She is quite critical of what she calls uneducated
mullahs who blame women for the problems in society.
"It is always women, women, women. And who's
listening to all these talks that the mullahs are
giving? [They] are men on Fridays. They go to Friday
prayer and they are listening to this."
Imam Basher Al Hadad of the Jelil Hayat Mosque in
Erbil says he cannot speak for all the mullahs, but
he says the Koran does not condone honor killings.
"Women are human and killing humans without any just
reason is forbidden. So killing women is also
forbidden. You mustn't do it."
At the art exhibit Chilura Hardi says she is
encouraged by comments she hears from some of the
men in attendance. "Any man who sees this will be
changed.
The honor killing is starting from the communities.
So starting from the children, we have to learn them
there is no difference between female and male."
Ultimately, Hardi says to end the practice of honor
killing, leaders must speak out, laws must be
enforced and attitudes towards women on every level
of society must change.
voanews com
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