'Honour Killings' in Pakistan and Compliance of ... - Aurat Foundation

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hold through these illegal forms of justice. The judgments declared by these men (they are always men) are often arbitrary, patriarchal and very anti-women, such as giving women in exchange, women in revenge, and treating women as bargaining chips and property. 18. There is little awareness of the 2004 law on honour killings. The community at large either does not know of it, or does not know the specifics of the law. But what is far worse is that this ignorance also exists within the fundamental players of the justice sector, including the police, lawyers and even judges. The duty of all of these players is to remain updated on the law, but as interviews reveal, most are unaware of even the existence of the 2004 laws. This is worrying, as without the awareness of the law within the community, it will have no deterring effect. Further, if the justice sector, specifically the police is unaware of the law, they will never correctly charge the perpetrators nor implement any safeguards of the 2004 law, allowing women to be as vulnerable as they were before. 19. The police is often unwilling to implement the law due to the overwhelming social acceptance of the act and the influence of power holders. Often they are reluctant to take the case forward, as mostly the cases are compromised out of court. The police often try to bring about this negotiation themselves, as they feel that it is for the benefit of both parties to avoid the hassle of a court case and settle the matter before taking it to court. 20. Some positive aspects of the promulgation of the law include that it opened barriers to openly discuss the issue of human rights. It has brought the issue into the mainstream and has increased the national and international coverage of the issue. The fact that the 79
media coverage shows honour killings in a negative light has the effect of building social intolerance for the crime. It is not as easy to commit honour killings as before without facing some consequences, even if it is public humiliation, nor is it openly justified by many as being a ‘cultural tradition’. 21. The community plays an important role as instigator to such crimes, especially by perpetuating the subordinate role of women and the attitude that they have to be ‘punished’ should they transgress this role. In cases of honour killings, it plays a passive role and tries not to get involved, because this could result in a feud against them. The victim’s family also suffers as the community isolates them socially. 22. Society in general has disrespect for the judicial system and legal institutions owing to a variety of problems in the system, such as delays in cases, high costs of litigation, etc. 23. The police face a number of problems, such as lack of funds and personnel to deal with the cases, specifically trained men and women. Apart from internal problems, externally too investigating these cases is difficult for the police as they do not have modern knowledge or resources to investigate crimes. Further, often there is collusion between the perpetrators and the victim’s family where false witnesses and false complainants are brought forward in order to ensure a weak case for the prosecution, probably because they do not want the matter to be publicized, or they prefer to compromise. Therefore, the perpetrators are declared innocent and the case can never be taken back to court. Such matters are out of the hands of the police. 80
Page 2 and 3:
A Pilot Study on: ‘Honour Killing
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Table of Contents Preface 1 Introdu
Page 8 and 9:
Preface Elimination of all negative
Page 10 and 11:
the nature and extent of its compli
Page 12 and 13:
Introduction The Criminal Law (Amen
Page 14:
formalised by the State and ‘lega
Page 17 and 18:
Gender is one of the organisational
Page 19 and 20:
their rights were achieved on paper
Page 21 and 22:
elatives), in effect excluding all
Page 24 and 25:
3. “Honour Killings”: their Pre
Page 26 and 27:
patrilineage 17 . From this follows
Page 28 and 29:
compensation negotiated to end a di
Page 30:
divorced or excommunicated, an act
Page 33 and 34:
Article 340 of the Jordanian Penal
Page 35 and 36: monitor women’s movements and kil
Page 37 and 38: mitigation, compensation for the he
Page 39 and 40: The discretion of the court to deci
Page 41 and 42: down for such cases. This applies t
Page 43 and 44: to properly determine the issue bef
Page 45 and 46: Table 1: Number & Percentages of Ca
Page 47 and 48: the police stations are not even eq
Page 49 and 50: Findings of the Research The findin
Page 51 and 52: When asked about the lack of filing
Page 53 and 54: Gujrat Gujrat also shows a similar
Page 55 and 56: community. Perhaps this has been on
Page 57 and 58: eporting it will do when registerin
Page 59 and 60: Jillani reiterated Justice Abbasi
Page 61 and 62: death and it was subsequently disco
Page 63 and 64: Lahore High Court The Lahore High C
Page 65 and 66: meditation falling under the defini
Page 67 and 68: for conservative and biased interpr
Page 70 and 71: 6. Perspective of the Community Whi
Page 72 and 73: mindset and existing confining soci
Page 74 and 75: even if cases are brought to them,
Page 76 and 77: Role of the Community It is general
Page 78 and 79: court settlement is preferred. Such
Page 80 and 81: 7. Conclusion and Main Findings It
Page 82 and 83: 6. There are also problems with the
Page 84 and 85: 12. These precedents are not necess
Page 88: 24. The police can play a very nega
Page 91: The police system is in dire need o
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