Posted on 02/04/2005 8:56:17 AM PST by knighthawk
Hulya Gulbahar, 43, refuses to accept the on-going "honour" killings of women in Turkey. A lawyer in Istanbul, she is one of the founders of the Turkish Penal Code (TCK) Women's Platform - a forum of women activists from 30 NGOs nationwide that has worked towards a substantial amendment to the country's outdated TCK.
Prompted by the European Union to revamp its legislation before Turkey joins the Union as a member, and thanks to a fierce fight put up by activists like Gulbahar, the reformed legislation now includes a life sentence for those involved in honour killings. The rape of a spouse is illegal, domestic violence is recognised as torture, incest is outlawed, and rapists who previously escaped punishment by marrying their victims will no longer walk free.
"Prior to the new legislation, punishment for committing a murder in the name of honour killings was two-and-a-half years in jail, after which the murderer received a hero's welcome back into the community," says Gulbahar, for whom the battle has only just begun.
Guldunya Toren, 22, who gave birth to a boy out of wedlock in Istanbul was shot to death early this year (2004). Toren survived the first attempt on her life and while in hospital she asked for police protection and a place to stay. She was still wondering where she would end up after leaving the hospital when a male relative disguised as a visitor came to her bedside and murdered her. Gulbahar flagged off a campaign after the murder of Toren with the slogan, "We Want Shelter, Not A Grave".
Aysegul Porsuk was stabbed in public 51 times by her husband in Adana, Turkey's fourth largest city and commercial capital of the eastern Mediterranean coast. No one, including security guards, came to her rescue. According to Gulbahar, 97 per cent of women in the country today are threatened with some form of violence.
"Women are massacred without mercy because they are still seen only as the property of the patriarch. If a woman disobeys, she is punished and the recurrent verdict is death," says Gulbahar, who helped to establish The Purple Roof Women's Shelter Foundation in 1990 to provide alternative accommodation for women facing domestic violence. Due to a lack of funds, the shelter has closed down. However, campaigns like "Scream So That Everyone Will Hear" continue, encouraging women to talk about the violence they face in their daily lives.
The Foundation also emails a newsletter to 10,000 addresses each month to keep women connected, even those in remote parts of the country. It is an attempt to raise awareness amongst a community groomed to feel that it is the right of men in the family to abuse women if they disobey because they believe that domestic violence is a personal, family affair. "We want to expose violence against women and drag it to the centre of public debate," says Gulbahar.
"The State cannot make changes merely by making new laws. The laws have to be implemented and encouraged," Gulbahar adds. It is not religion, poverty, ignorance or alcohol that is responsible for the violence, she explains, but an entire system that reinforces it. "All institutions, including the medical, police, legal, business and cultural, only help men to continue to demand that women obey and serve them."
European Union standards require the State to provide at least one shelter (for women) per 7,500 people. Currently, Turkey has only 11 shelters. Of these, eight are under the umbrella of the Social Services and the Child Protection Institution and are able to provide accommodation to only 250 women at a time. According to the State Institute of Statistics the population of the country is 87.8 million - males at 34.3 million and females at 33.5 million. "In line with EU criterion, there is a need for 9,040 shelters. We would like to see at least 10 shelters each in large cities like Istanbul, Ankara and Izmir opened immediately," says Gulbahar.
She says that just before an election, the municipal bodies announce several new shelters for women but once the elections are over, the shelters are closed down. Besides, at the existing municipal shelters, men are able to trace their wives easily, and they usually succeed in taking them home again and to punish them further for running away.
"It is not only existing laws that need to be changed. The very mentality and attitude of society must change before violence against women is ended," says Gulbahar, who wants the government to finance shelters run solely by women who are sensitive to the victim's point of view. She also calls for routine inspection of these shelters by independent watchdog groups. She asserts that once a woman comes into a police station or a shelter, she should be provided immediate refuge without quarrels over her age, sexual preference, class, ethnicity, religion, or marital status.
Gulbahar's personal and political struggle for women's rights began when she heard her father tell her mother that the blue-eyed, blonde, newborn baby boy could not be his. "I must have been about 10 years old. My heart bled for the dignity of my beautiful mother," says Gulbahar. Sitting in her Istanbul office while outside a queue of women awaits her counsel, she recalls that her mother promptly dragged her children to a doctor to prove that her husband was indeed the father of them all. "That incident was so humiliating for all of us, and I cannot forget that it was all because of one man."
When she was 11, her father forbade her to play football without giving her a reason: So Gulbahar learned to sew clothes to pay for her education and travelled from her hometown in Izmir to live in Istanbul ac, a teenager, refusing to let anyone tell her what to do with her life. After having lived with a man for 19 years, she decided that she was better off alone. Why? "Because he tried to control me," says Gulbahar simply.
Islam-list
If people want on or off this list, please let me know.
The Mafia has more honor than the islamofacist scum.
bets on how long she will last?
Ok, it´s no longer "heroic". Instead it´s just "glorious" - or what?
Frankly, we should institute "stress" killings for when our mates drive us to distraction.
Hi knighthawk. I have been on your Europe list for a while. Can you please put me on the islam ping list as well?
Cheers.
It was not that they did not come to her rescue. The police officers on the case were incompetent and for fear of causing the assailant to inflict fatal wounds on the victim, tried to stay away and persuade the guy to let her go. I watched it on TV. The cops were later punished for incompetence.
The reason these killings got lower sentences is that it was considered a provocation. Now it isn't. The Penal code was modeled upon the old Swiss model which took financial crimes much more seriously than others. So if you stab someone for no reason, you could get out in a few years but if you stab them and take their money, you'd be looking at over ten years in the big house. Unbelievably stupid but it takes time to change all the laws.
Ofcourse they are only called Kurds in EU and US media if the Turkish government is being accused of having mistreated them in some way.
The reason these killings got lower sentences is that it was considered a provocation. Now it isn't. The Penal code was modeled upon the old Swiss model which took financial crimes much more seriously than others. So if you stab someone for no reason, you could get out in a few years but if you stab the guy and take his money, you'd be looking at over ten years in the big house. Unbelievably stupid but it takes time to change all the laws.
I did.
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