A man killed his 14-year-old daughter while asleep. The 20-year-old mother of a toddler was tortured and murdered by her husband. Honor killings are sanctioned and institutionalized by the laws of the clerical regime in Iran.
Romina Ashrafi, 14, was arrested after she ran away with the boy she loved and wanted to marry. Despite her insistence, the judge presiding the Court of Talesh (northern Iran) ruled that she be returned home to her family.
On the night of May 21, 2020, when Romina was asleep, her father took a sickle and cut her head from the back of her neck.
According to the clerical regime’s Penal Code, Romina’s father will not face the common punishment of “retribution” (Qesas) which is regularly handed down for those convicted of murder. Article 301 of the Iranian regime’s Islamic Punishment Law, “the father or the paternal grandfather who kill their own children are not punished” because they “own” their children’s blood.
In yet another shocking example of honor killings, Hajareh Hossein-bor was murdered on May 4, by her husband.
Hajareh lived in the town of Gasht, 65 kilometers from the city of Saravan in Sistan and Baluchestan Province (southeastern Iran). She studied up to the 8th grade and was not allowed to finish high school. She was compelled to get married when she was 16. She had a 2-year-old son.
Hajareh was regularly battered at home by her husband, Esmael Gomshadzehi. He beat her up and burned her by hot wire. She had told her family about this, several times, but they ignored her and did not take any action.
Finally, in the evening of May 4, 2020, just after the sunset, Esmael dragged Hajareh out of their home. A few hours later, he abandoned her battered, semi-dead body outside a hospital and ran away.
A hospital nurse said when Hajareh was taken inside, her digestive tract had been burned by the acid forced down her throat. She was virtually unconscious and could hardly breathe. Her head was full of thorns and both of her arms and hands had been pounded by stone.
According to this nurse, because of the acid poured into her mouth, Hajareh had no tooth remaining and many of her bones had been broken. (The state-run didarnews.com – May 23, 2020)
Not only violence against women, domestic violence and honor killings have not been criminalized in the Constitution and other laws of the clerical regime in Iran, but they are sanctioned and institutionalized.
