Honor Killings in Pakistan
After reading about the recent “honor killings” in Pakistan, Nafees Khan, (”an educated and practicing Muslim woman”) wrote a letter to the Toronto Star expressing her disgust with the reporter’s contention that ” honor killings routinely occur in this conservative Islamic nation.” Actually, there were 1,200 young women murdered in Pakistan last year for the “crime” of adultery, and over 80 per cent of the killers were acquitted. The case Khan was referring to concerned the murder of three children, aged 4-7-8- and their 25 year old step-sister by their 40 year old, devout Muslim father. It seems that the husband of the eldest daughter accused her of adultery, and because he feared that the children might follow her bad example, the father slit the throats of all four. In another horrific case, a 16 year old girl was attending a wedding reception when a young man took her hand in his, The girl quickly withdrew her hand, but it was too late, Her brothers had witnessed the “crime,” so they killed her. Islamic law does not, according to Khan, prescribe or condone the killing of adulterous girls by their fathers or brothers. Khan then goes on to explain the proper procedure for executing adulterers according to Islamic jurisprudence. Many scholars believe that Rudyard Kipling’s words: “Oh, East is East, and West is West, and never the twain shall meet” weren’t intended to mean that the cultural differences between East and West are un-bridgeable. “Never,” of course, is a long time. However, when “honor killers are routinely acquitted, suicide- bombers are hailed as heroic-martyrs, and when an educated, modern Muslim woman living in Toronto talks of the lawful way to execute adulterers, it’s plain to see that the ‘twain” won’t be meeting anytime soon.
William Bedford
Toronto, Ont
