1. Presented By: Ayat Abed Isaid Crimes In The Name Of “Honour ”

2. When A life is Worth LESS than An Honour “Rana Husseini, The Jordan Times” –Honour killing is claiming the lives of more than 25 women every year according to a study in June 2009 entitled, Crimes of Honour in Jordan and the Arab World, by attorney Lubna Dawany Nimry. –Violence against women in Jordan and in Canada is a violation of human rights and a crime against humanity and honour killing is a crisis that needs rectifying.

3. What Are Honour Killings? -Honour killing is a practice in which men kill female relatives in the name of family ‘honour’ for forced or suspected sexual activity outside marriage, even when they have been victims of rape. - The acts which are the cause of dishonor can be: refusing an arranged marriage being the victim of a sexual assault or rape seeking a divorce, even from an abusive husband committing adultery or fornication pre-marital sex flirting

4. Rana Husseini Rana Husseini, is an investigative journalist working with the Jordan Times. She is also an internationally recognized and award winning journalist and human rights defender who broke the silence in Jordan by exposing the phenomenon of so-called crimes of honour.

5. The LAW The law in Jordan as it stands appears to condone the practice of honour killings: Article 340 of the Jordanian Penal Code states that "he who discovers his wife or one of his female relatives committing adultery with another, and he kills, wounds or injures one or both of them, is exempt from any penalty"(The Jordanian Penal Code, article 340).

6. Honour Killing: Texas, January, 2008 “Yaser Said of Lewisville, TX killed his daughters Sarah and Amina in January of 2008, angry that one of his daughters was dating a non-Muslim boy. Sarah Said's final phone call rang into the Irving police dispatcher about 7:30 p.m. on New Year's Day: ‘I’m dying, I’m dying, I’m dying…’ Family members say he had physically abused and threatened his daughters and his 36-year-old wife, Patricia, for more than a decade, and was prone to violent outbursts and diatribes about the corrupting influence of Western culture on his children.” (Source: Fox News, January 10, 2008 )

7. Honour Killing: Italy, August 2006 “Hina Saleem, 21-year old Pakistani- Italian, was killed with a meat knife by her father for living with Italian boyfriend. She was found by police Aug. 11, 2006, buried in a shallow grave in her family's backyard Her mother, in Pakistan at the time of the murder, acknowledged to police that her husband had killed Saleem who ‘did not behave like a good Muslim girl.’ Saleem's father--a legal resident of Italy since 1989-told police: ‘My daughter was a prostitute, living with that Italian. I killed her out of rage.” (Source: “Italy: 'Honor Killing' in Italy spurs quest for justice.” August 16, 2007, Women’s E-News.)

8. Honour Killing : Toronto, December 2007 “On December 10 th 2007, 16 year old Aqsa Parvez was strangled to death over a dispute concerning her refusal to wear a Hejab (a.k.a headscarf). Parvez’s brother and father were both charged with first degree murder. The international media and Human Rights groups reported on the incident as an “honour killing”. (Source: “the Toronto Star.)

9. Honour Killing: Belgium, October 2007 “ Sadia Sheikh, originally from Pakistan, had a tough time at home. Sadia’s parents thought their daughter was too Western, with her jeans and her Belgian boyfriend. They had promised Sadia to a man in Pakistan. The marriage had been arranged, the wedding gown was already hanging in the closet. Moussadra, the 24-year old brother of Sadia, shot both of his sisters in broad daylight on October 22, in front of their parental home in Lodelinsart, a suburb of Charleroi.” (Source: Belgisch Nieuwsblad, Belgium, 15 November 2007)

10. What Can Be Done? -The United Nations has been working closely with Women’s organizations campaigning against honour killing, especially in Jordan, Lebanon, and Pakistan. -The UN is now helping launch awareness programmes and organizing sensitization workshops on violence against women in Pakistan, Jordan, and Bangladesh. -Legal and preventative measures should be taken seriously into consideration. For example, we need to make sure that allegations of violence and abuses against women are treated as serious crimes and people who commit them should be punished. -Take all necessary steps to spread awareness among men who commit such crimes and make them aware of the consequences. -We need to make sure that children and boys in particular, are aware of gender equality from an early age.

11. Final Thoughts The honour killings examined in this paper are integrated with religious practices and indigenous beliefs. In a society where murders are common, protection from any penalty provides the parties to a conflict an insurance against death and jail sentence, the lives of many women and men are still in danger. Rana Husseni said, “One in three women in the world will be subjected to some form of violence at one point in their lives. That is a big number and that is why we have to constantly address this issue and raise awareness. The more we talk about it, the more we give women hope and help them know that there is hope and that someone could help them and there are organizations that help.”

12. All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood. ” —Article 1 of the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHRUnited Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights