European press accounts of honour killings launched legal interventions into Muslim communities

Evidence

In the area of forced marriages, the remarkably long reach of the law into the lives of Muslim communities in Europe began with press reports of Muslim women being killed for refusing marriage arrangements made on their behalf, murders often described as ‘honour killings.’ In Sweden, in a case that reverberated throughout Scandinavia, Fadime Sahindal, of Kurdish origin, was killed by her father on the day she planned to move in with her Swedish boyfriend and after she had publicized on Swedish television her plight as a victim of a forced marriage to a cousin in her country of origin. In Norway, Shazia Seleh was reported dead in Pakistan some time after she had sought the help of a Norwegian crisis centre to escape marriage arrangements made by her family. Her death was explored in a series of documentaries made by the Norwegian government, and it sparked an initiative to seek an agreement with Pakistan against forced marriages. Rukhsana Naz, a British citizen and pregnant mother of two, was killed by her mother and brother for having a sexual relationship outside of marriage, a crime for which they were both convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment. — Sherene Razack, Casting Out, 294

Categorization

• CANDY: Fadime Sahindal’s case is a compact fact: killed by her father on the very day she planned to move in with her Swedish boyfriend, after publicizing her plight on TV.