http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051228/ap_on_re_as/pakistan_honor_killings

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"MULTAN, Pakistan - Nazir Ahmed appears calm and unrepentant as he recounts how he slit the throats of his three young daughters and their 25-year old stepsister to salvage his family's "honor" — a crime that shocked Pakistan. The 40-year old laborer, speaking to The Associated Press in police detention as he was being shifted to prison, confessed to just one regret — that he didn't murder the stepsister's alleged lover too. Hundreds of girls and women are murdered by male relatives each year in this conservative Islamic nation, and rights groups said Wednesday such "honor killings" will only stop when authorities get serious about punishing perpetrators. The independent Human Rights Commission of Pakistan said that in more than half of such cases that make it to court, most end with cash settlements paid by relatives to the victims' families, although under a law passed last year, the minimum penalty is 10 years, the maximum death by hanging. Ahmed's killing spree — witnessed by his wife Rehmat Bibi as she cradled their 3 month-old baby son — happened Friday night at their home in the cotton-growing village of Gago Mandi in eastern Punjab province. It is the latest of more than 260 such honor killings documented by the rights commission, mostly from media reports, during the first 11 months of 2005. Bibi recounted how she was woken by a shriek as Ahmed put his hand to the mouth of his stepdaughter Muqadas and cut her throat with a machete. Bibi looked helplessly on from the corner of the room as he then killed the three girls — Bano, 8, Sumaira, 7, and Humaira, 4 — pausing between the slayings to brandish the bloodstained knife at his wife, warning her not to intervene or raise alarm. "I was shivering with fear. I did not know how to save my daughters," Bibi, sobbing, told AP by phone from the village. "I begged my husband to spare my daughters but he said, 'If you make a noise, I will kill you.'" "The whole night the bodies of my daughters lay in front of me," she said. The next morning, Ahmed was arrested. Speaking to AP in the back of police pickup truck late Tuesday as he was shifted to a prison in the city of Multan, Ahmed showed no contrition. Appearing disheveled but composed, he said he killed Muqadas because she had committed adultery, and his daughters because he didn't want them to do the same when they grew up. He said he bought a butcher's knife and a machete after midday prayers on Friday and hid them in the house where he carried out the killings. "I thought the younger girls would do what their eldest sister had done, so they should be eliminated," he said, his hands cuffed, his face unshaven. "We are poor people and we have nothing else to protect but our honor." Despite Ahmed's contention that Muqadas had committed adultery — a claim made by her husband — the rights commission reported that according to local people, Muqadas had fled her husband because he had abused her and forced her to work in a brick-making factory. Police have said they do not know the identity or whereabouts of Muqadas' alleged lover. Muqadas was Bibi's daughter by her first marriage to Ahmed's brother, who died 14 years ago. Ahmed married his brother's widow, as is customary under Islamic tradition. "Women are treated as property and those committing crimes against them do not get punished," said the rights commission's director, Kamla Hyat. "The steps taken by our government have made no real difference." Activists accuse President Gen. Pervez Musharraf, a self-styled moderate Muslim, of reluctance to reform outdated Islamized laws that make it difficult to secure convictions in rape, acid attacks and other cases of violence against women. They say police are often reluctant to prosecute, regarding such crimes as family disputes. Statistics on honor killings are confused and imprecise, but figures from the rights commission's Web site and its officials show a marked reduction in cases this year: 267 in the first 11 months of 2005, compared with 579 during all of 2004. The Ministry of Women's Development said it had no reliable figures. Ijaz Elahi, the ministry's joint secretary, said the violence was decreasing and that increasing numbers of victims were reporting incidents to police or the media. Laws, including one passed last year to beef up penalties for honor killings, had been toughened, she said. Police in Multan said they would complete their investigation into Ahmed's case in the next two weeks and that he faces the death sentence if he is convicted for the killings and terrorizing his neighborhood. Ahmed, who did not resist arrest, was unrepentant. "I told the police that I am an honorable father and I slaughtered my dishonored daughter and the three other girls," he said. "I wish that I get a chance to eliminate the boy she ran away with and set his home on fire.""

12/28/2005 3:05:26 PM

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"Appearing disheveled but composed, he said he killed Muqadas because she had committed adultery, and his daughters because he didn't want them to do the same when they grew up."

12/28/2005 3:21:55 PM

i didn't read it

but how is she his stepdaughter?

did he remarry or something?

because if so

hippo-crit

12/28/2005 3:49:12 PM

^he married his brother's wife after his brother died.

12/28/2005 4:34:51 PM

thats some diluted Keyser Soze shit right there

12/28/2005 6:19:14 PM

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"Muqadas had fled her husband because he had abused her and forced her to work in a brick-making factory."

brick-making, sounds sweet to me

12/28/2005 6:52:30 PM

Sheesh.

Totally honorable.

12/28/2005 7:04:34 PM

yes, but we need to learn to "understand" and "appreciate" these cultures

12/28/2005 7:28:30 PM

If I had a nickel for everytime I heard one of those crazy lefties condoning honor killings and violence against women, why, I'd be a rich man...

12/28/2005 9:05:11 PM

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"I wish that I get a chance to eliminate the boy she ran away with and set his home on fire."

sweet quote

12/28/2005 9:57:40 PM

If I had a nickel for everytime I heard one of those crazy lefties condoning honor killings and violence against women, why, I'd be a rich man... not have any money

12/28/2005 11:59:06 PM

If I had a nickel for everytime I heard one of those crazy lefties [deny] condoning honor killings and violence against women, why, I'd be a rich man...

12/29/2005 12:29:51 AM

Yes, we often have to deny such things.

Because dipshits who don't know anything about us keep accusing us of it.


In fact, we (teh Left) have a history of fighting for these things called "human/women's rights," which the Right has only recently (and in very specific circumstances) started caring about now that it's politically convenient.

12/29/2005 12:46:42 AM

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"In fact, we (teh Left) have a history of fighting for these things called "human/women's rights," which the Right has only recently (and in very specific circumstances) started caring about now that it's politically convenient."

wins

12/29/2005 12:53:23 AM

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"In fact, we (teh Left) have a history of fighting for these things called "human/women's rights," which the Right has only recently (and in very specific circumstances) started caring about now that it's politically convenient."

pwnt

12/29/2005 2:35:27 AM

Man, this really saddens and angers me.

Some 2,000 women have been "honor-killed" in Pakistan in the past few years.

It is a big problem in Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Jordan, Palestine, and a couple of other countries. And not just killings, which if you ask me, is much better and more humane. Untold numbers of women are vicitims of gang-rapes, acid attacks (on the face), burnings, and other untold tortures. And after these, these women are secluded in their houses till they die, because no man would ever marry them, even though it was not their fault.

What's even more frustrating and uglier is that these are not considered murders by the local laws, so the perpetrators go to jail for like 6 months (or usually never), or are just fined.

But just recently Pervez Musharraf signed into law a bill designating honor-killings as murders.

And Queen Rania of Jordan has also been campaigning for the same in her country, and I can't remember now, but I think she succeeded recently after years of campaigning.

As for the original story, I think the guy should be given the same treatment that Mel Gibson received in Brave Heart to save the "honor" of the country.

12/29/2005 12:04:30 PM

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" I think the guy should be given the same treatment that Mel Gibson received in Brave Heart to save the "honor" of the country."

An Oscar?

12/29/2005 12:28:59 PM

^ ha ha.

12/29/2005 12:31:17 PM

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""In fact, we (teh Left) have a history of fighting for these things called "human/women's rights," which the Right has only recently (and in very specific circumstances) started caring about now that it's politically convenient.""

Robert Byrd, for example.

12/29/2005 2:35:36 PM

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"If I had a nickel for everytime I heard one of those crazy lefties condoning honor killings and violence against women, why, I'd be a rich man..."

I don't think that this is what Excoriator was getting at.

There is a tendency, more so on the left, to condemn the idea of one culture being inferior to another. Excoriator I usually lean more to the side of thinking that any culture in which you can torture or kill women with impunity is inferior and should be called such.

Now someone will take this to mean that I think our culture is perfect, failing to recognize that inferior/superior are terms describing relative positions.

12/29/2005 4:44:05 PM

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"Robert Byrd, for example."

I think that's more an example of someone ignoring human rights because it was politically convenient.

And that was very original, by the way. Congratulations.

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"I don't think that this is what Excoriator was getting at. There is a tendency, more so on the left, to condemn the idea of one culture being inferior to another."

Exactly. This is what happens when you start believing in your strawmen. He asked himself, "hmmm... how would my ultra-tolerant strawman liberal hippie douche respond to this story." Hence his response.

[Edited on December 29, 2005 at 6:26 PM. Reason : All this assuming he wasn't being a troll, which would be an incorrect assumption.]

12/29/2005 6:25:42 PM

It wasn't as though he was responding to any particular person here, which I think detracts from its straw man-ness.

There are people who think that considering one culture superior to another is abominable, and he seems to have been calling them out as a group. Even though he was trolling.

12/30/2005 12:26:19 AM

this reminds me of the Black dude who had all of his kids hold up in his house and he rapped abunch of them and then killed them. Wtf is wrong with people.

anyone got that story?

12/30/2005 10:21:14 AM

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"I think that's more an example of someone ignoring human rights because it was politically convenient."

In Robert Byrd's case, I seriously doubt it. I'll grant you that there are those that do--Al Gore Sr would probably be a good example--but Byrd is not one of them.

But your idea that the left has been carrying the light of equality for decades while the stodgy right has been trying to piss on it is wrong. Most of the Civil Rights era votes were split not by party, but by north and south (which was a Democrat stronghold until the 60's or so). And don't forget that 'fine' Republicans such as Strom and Jesse started as Democrats, became Dixiecrats, and then became Republicans. And, as far as I'm concerned, you can have them back.

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"And that was very original, by the way. Congratulations."

Yeah. Sorry that I defiled the temple of originality and higher thought that is The Wolf Web.

12/30/2005 11:17:12 AM

Apology accepted.

12/31/2005 8:20:41 AM

This is why I can't be an anthroplogist. I guess I just have limits to how much relativism I can subscribe to. I mean, I can say that "yes, this is their culture, and I understand it in its own right, but i feel like it's still my prerogative to kill those men."

Seriously, I'm just sitting here trying to come up with a punishment severe enough, I have some ideas, but I definatly think that whatever the punishment is (and hanging is not quite gruesome enough for me) it should be very public (like all punishment--but that's another topic.)

1/3/2006 10:09:38 AM

I'll take this one incident to be representative of an entire culture, why not?

1/3/2006 10:39:42 AM

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"Seriously, I'm just sitting here trying to come up with a punishment severe enough, I have some ideas, but I definatly think that whatever the punishment is (and hanging is not quite gruesome enough for me) it should be very public (like all punishment--but that's another topic.)"

I came up with the definitive answer way up:

Quote :

"As for the original story, I think the guy should be given the same treatment that Mel Gibson received in Brave Heart to save the "honor" of the country."

1/3/2006 1:45:20 PM