'Honour killing' sister breaks her silence | the Daily Mail

Posted on June 18th, 2007 by martijn.
Categories: Gender, Kinship & Marriage Issues.

‘Honour killing’ sister breaks her silence | the Daily Mail

By HELEN WEATHERS –
Britain was appalled by the horrific ‘honour killing’ of a girl murdered by her father for daring to kiss the man she loved.

Here, her sister, who narrowly escaped death herself and now lives in fear of her life, breaks her silence.

Every time Bekhal Mahmod leaves the safety of her home, she wears the hijab with a black veil covering her face – even though she would give anything for the freedom not to have to.

She has no family to turn to, few friends, and has to lie to new acquaintances about who she is and where she is from. She is constantly looking over her shoulder.

“My life will always be at risk,” says 22-year-old Bekhal. “There are people in my community who want to see me dead, and they will not rest until I am. I will never be safe. I wear the veil so no one can recognise me.”

It is a desperately lonely and isolated existence, but at least she is alive – unlike her younger sister Banaz.

Both young women brought “shame” on their strict Muslim Iraqi Kurdish family by disobeying their father Mahmod.

Bekhal, 22, ran away aged 16 rather than agree to an arranged marriage to a cousin in Iraq.

She survived an attempted killing by her brother, but her sister Banaz, 20, paid the ultimate price for leaving her own arranged marriage and then falling in love with an “unsuitable man” of her own choice.

On the orders of her 52-year-old father and uncle, Ari Mahmod, 50, she was strangled with a bootlace by Kurdish assassins, her body stuffed in a suitcase and buried six feet down in the garden of a house belonging to an associate in Birmingham.

Two of the murderers, who fled back to Iraq after this horrific so-called “honour killing”, have since boasted of raping Banaz before she died in January 2006.

“Honour killing?” cries Bekhal. “Where is the honour in a father putting his status in the community before the life of his own flesh and blood?

“They should be disgusted with themselves. Honour in our community is about men having the upper hand, having the ruling power.

“Banaz was the most beautiful, loving, caring, easy-going girl you could ever hope to meet. Her only crime was to want to have some say in her life. Where is the shame in that?

“After I refused an arranged marriage, I knew I had two choices; stay and be killed, or leave and live. I chose to live but I had to leave everything behind.”

Bekhal was one of the key prosecution witnesses at the three-month trial of her father and uncle, which this week resulted in their convictions at the Old Bailey for murder.

They have yet to be sentenced. A third man, Mohamad Hama, 30, of South Norwood, London, had already admitted the killing.

The other key witness was Banaz’s boyfriend Rahmat Sulemani, 29, whose own life was threatened because he was considered an unsuitable match for Banaz, despite also being Iraqi.

Bekhal and Rahmat now face a future of secret addresses and identities under police protection.

“When I stared into the eyes of my father in court, there wasn’t even a twitch of guilt,” says Bekhal. “No emotion at all. I still love him because he is my father, but I can never forgive nor understand what he did.
(more…)

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‘Honour killing’ sister breaks her silence | the Daily Mail

Posted on June 18th, 2007 by .
Categories: Gender, Kinship & Marriage Issues.

‘Honour killing’ sister breaks her silence | the Daily Mail

By HELEN WEATHERS –
Britain was appalled by the horrific ‘honour killing’ of a girl murdered by her father for daring to kiss the man she loved.

Here, her sister, who narrowly escaped death herself and now lives in fear of her life, breaks her silence.

Every time Bekhal Mahmod leaves the safety of her home, she wears the hijab with a black veil covering her face – even though she would give anything for the freedom not to have to.

She has no family to turn to, few friends, and has to lie to new acquaintances about who she is and where she is from. She is constantly looking over her shoulder.

“My life will always be at risk,” says 22-year-old Bekhal. “There are people in my community who want to see me dead, and they will not rest until I am. I will never be safe. I wear the veil so no one can recognise me.”

It is a desperately lonely and isolated existence, but at least she is alive – unlike her younger sister Banaz.

Both young women brought “shame” on their strict Muslim Iraqi Kurdish family by disobeying their father Mahmod.

Bekhal, 22, ran away aged 16 rather than agree to an arranged marriage to a cousin in Iraq.

She survived an attempted killing by her brother, but her sister Banaz, 20, paid the ultimate price for leaving her own arranged marriage and then falling in love with an “unsuitable man” of her own choice.

On the orders of her 52-year-old father and uncle, Ari Mahmod, 50, she was strangled with a bootlace by Kurdish assassins, her body stuffed in a suitcase and buried six feet down in the garden of a house belonging to an associate in Birmingham.

Two of the murderers, who fled back to Iraq after this horrific so-called “honour killing”, have since boasted of raping Banaz before she died in January 2006.

“Honour killing?” cries Bekhal. “Where is the honour in a father putting his status in the community before the life of his own flesh and blood?

“They should be disgusted with themselves. Honour in our community is about men having the upper hand, having the ruling power.

“Banaz was the most beautiful, loving, caring, easy-going girl you could ever hope to meet. Her only crime was to want to have some say in her life. Where is the shame in that?

“After I refused an arranged marriage, I knew I had two choices; stay and be killed, or leave and live. I chose to live but I had to leave everything behind.”

Bekhal was one of the key prosecution witnesses at the three-month trial of her father and uncle, which this week resulted in their convictions at the Old Bailey for murder.

They have yet to be sentenced. A third man, Mohamad Hama, 30, of South Norwood, London, had already admitted the killing.

The other key witness was Banaz’s boyfriend Rahmat Sulemani, 29, whose own life was threatened because he was considered an unsuitable match for Banaz, despite also being Iraqi.

Bekhal and Rahmat now face a future of secret addresses and identities under police protection.

“When I stared into the eyes of my father in court, there wasn’t even a twitch of guilt,” says Bekhal. “No emotion at all. I still love him because he is my father, but I can never forgive nor understand what he did.
(more…)

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