Turkish Man Kills 14-Year-Old Daughter

Yahoo! News ^ | 4/30/2004 | SUZAN FRASER

[Hermann the Cherusker]

Turkish Man Kills 14-Year-Old Daughter

Thu Apr 29, 2:41 PM ET

By SUZAN FRASER, Associated Press Writer

ANKARA, Turkey - Ignoring the pleas of his 14-year-old daughter to spare her life, Mehmet Halitogullari pulled on a wire wrapped around her neck and strangled her — supposedly to restore the family's honor after she was kidnapped and raped.

Nuran Halitogullari, buried Thursday in a ceremony attended by women's rights advocates, is the latest victim in a long history of so-called "honor" killings, which Turkey's government is struggling to curb.

Each year, dozens of girls are killed in Turkey by their relatives for allegedly disgracing their families — some for merely being seen speaking to men. The practice is especially common in the more traditional southeast and among families who have migrated to big cities from the region.

Honor killings also occur in Pakistan and some countries of the Middle East and among immigrant families in EU countries like Britain and Sweden. The European Union (news - web sites), which Turkey aspires to join, is pressing the country to take steps to curb a practice it says is a violation of women's rights.

Parliament last year voted to raise the punishment for such crimes to as long as 24 years in prison. But a loophole in the laws allows relatives to escape with sentences as light as eight years if they can prove they were "provoked" into committing the crime.

European countries want Turkey to ensure that family members cannot benefit from the loophole.

"No reductions should be made and everyone should know that such crimes will be punished and that no one can escape," Sweden's ambassador to Turkey, Anne Dismorr, said in an interview with the weekly Nokta magazine. "In our view the main cause behind the honor killings is the fact that honor is regarded as grounds for reduced sentences."

Turkey has embarked on a major overhaul of its penal code and is expected to rectify the loophole, but the draft code is still weeks away from being endorsed. Some politicians on Thursday called on the government to immediately bring the issue to parliament.

Lawyer Senal Saruhan, a woman's rights advocate, fears the draft may not go far enough. She insists that family members who incite or encourage the killings should be punished alongside the perpetrators.

"Unless we bring severe punishments we will never stop these killings," she said.

Guldal Aksit, the minister in charge of women's issues, added that attitudes are what really need to be addressed to stop the deeply entrenched practice. "These are not problems that we can solve on paper by changing laws ... We need to educate society," she said.

Women's groups believe that a number of suicides among young women in the southeast are actually murders by relatives who believe they are saving the family honor. Often the youngest member of the family is forced to carry out the killings in the belief that a youth would get a less-stringent punishment.

On Wednesday, authorities charged two brothers with murder after they shot their 22-year-old sister in the head in her hospital bed, where she was recovering from an earlier attack by them. The woman had had a child out of wedlock.

Last year, a pregnant woman was reportedly stoned to death by her family after having an affair and buried in a pauper's grave after her family refused to hold a funeral.

In the latest case, newspapers said Halitogullari was abducted in Istanbul on her way back from a trip to the supermarket and raped over six days. She was rescued by police and returned to her family.

The murder came to light this week but it was not clear when it took place.

In a rare confession, Mehmet Hatipogullari told police he and other relatives took the girl to an aunt's home where he strangled her, ignoring her pleas and her cries.

"I decided to kill her because our honor was dirtied," the newspaper Sabah quoted the father as saying. "I didn't listen to her pleas, I wrapped the wire around her neck and pulled at it until she died."

He said he buried her body beneath a chicken coop, which upset his other children, and later reburied her in a forest.

The newspaper said Halitogullari also had planned to kill his daughter's rapist.

[cardinal4]

Turkey, until very recently (thanks to Islams growing cancerous spread) was a NATO ally to be trusted and counted upon. Very secular and not adhering to the foolishly medieval Koranic or Islamic laws, they were an island of "normalcy" in the Middle East. In addition, and recently, they forged strong political, and military ties with Israel. You are using their recent past to condemn them. I believe that their recent past demonstrates their ability to be civilized partners, This is of course, just my opinion..

[GOPJ]

The father is a monster and should be hung by his nuts. Since they lack the wit or sophistication to see ethics beyond sex organs -- this is an appropriate punishment.

[CatoRenasci]

Thanks for posting this. Unbelievable monsters. I hate to say it, or even think it, but the world would be a far better place if there were no Moslems anywhere and this violent, intolerant religion were wiped off the face of the earth, its doctrines relegated to historical studies as are the bloody religions of the Aztecs and the Assyrians.

[GOPJ]

Good point. Every Muslim hero - every Muslim religious role model-is a mass murderer. Within that culture there are no Lincoln's, no Washington's, etc. Just killers. And ethics? Muslim ethics revolve around women's sex organs.

Every Turk I have ever met was decent, hardworking and law abiding. This piece of filth was acting as an Islamic, not a Turk. Islam is scourge disease of filthy rapist and murderers. Blame the Koran and Islam not the Turks.…

[rrrod]

have to agree with ya there.

[Ciexyz]

All cultures and belief systems are equal. (/sarcasm off)

[Nevski]

"Bush said Islam is the religion of peace, therefore it is so."

C'mon. It should be obvious that Bush doesn't necessarily believe this personally, but that he says such things in an attempt (how successful we shall see) to win support among the more moderate Muslims. There is such a thing as "liberal" Islam, which is increasingly divorced from the teachings of Islam's "holy book." A head of state would be nuts to alienate these people, who number in the hundreds of millions and who are themselves threatened physically by the jihadists. Just look at recent events in Jordan.

No, there is no warranted criticism for Bush on this one.

Nevski

[mtbopfuyn]

And yet the world opened their morning newspapers today and saw the pictures of American "soldiers" attaching wires to Iraqi genitals. I'm going out on a limb here and assume those "soldiers" will claim they're Christian. I don't see much civility or humanity in either case.

[Cyber Ninja]

Just proves that "Thou shalt not kill" is not part of the Koran.

The Commandment is "Thou shalt not murder"
The Almighty is good with righteous or morally justified killing.

“Kill” was a poor translation from the original.

Please do not interpret this post in any way as a flaming.
This bad translation is an obsession of mine.
And I agree with your observation.

CB^)

[DAPFE8900]

Thank you i been saying and thinking this for so long.. How better for satan to fight the true god then to make a religion that can compete with god and well they have 2 billion followers. Looks like we are in for a long fight here my friends.. Only god can help now...'
173rd Airborne

[darkwing104]

Thanks, I meant murder. It seems to me that Islamists go to extremes justifying murder.

[a_Turk]

I certainly am ashamed of this practice of murdering the victim. I am also aghast at all those (christian)priests still breathing after having raped countless boys.. Some tolerate too little, some way too much..

[a_Turk]

>> Muslim ethics revolve around women's sex organs.

And by that logic do Christian ethics revolve around young boys' sex organs??

[a_Turk]

Also note that this is a certain ethnic group in southeastern Turkey that continues to practice this honor remedy..

[Hermann the Cherusker]

I certainly am ashamed of this practice of murdering the victim.

Good! I had to bring up its prevelance in Pakistan and India (among Hindus too, I believe, but for different reasons), to shame an Indian into silence who was haranguing me about our lack of gun control in the US. My pointed retort was that "Well, at least we don't need Propane Oven Control to prevent bride-bruning."

[montag813]

Islam is worse than Nazism. Islam is the cult of Satan. A Turkish "father" in upstate New York just did this last week to his wife, 22-year old daughter and 4-year old dayghter, and there seems to be a media blackout over it. The prosecutor said he might be "mentally ill". It would be unthinkable for him to mention the basis for this act in the Koran itself. WE CANNOT BE PERMITTED TO KNOW THE TRUTH ABOUT ISLAM. It is being protected at the highest levels---WHY????

[a_Turk]

The basis for this predates even Judaism.

[Mortimer Snavely]

I read somewhere that the Turkish Government has a kind of "witness protection program" for women who are under threat for honor killings: new identity, relocation, the works.

Any info?

[SevenDaysInMay]

Let Sharia prevail across post-Christian EUrope.

[Mortimer Snavely]

I work in a mental hospital. We get all kinds. We had one woman who helped her husband rape their infant child to death. I deal with lots and lots of incest victims, ten year old girls who had been raped by their fathers, young men who had been raped by their fathers, folks who will be just this side of barking mad for the rest of their lives, that sort of thing.

I see such people nearly every week, and they typically have extremely long hospitalizations.

I can say without hesitation that every victim and each of these predators were/are religiously preoccupied and are devout Bible Belt/Solid South Pentecostal/Charismatic Christians. Not even broaching the subject of Catholic priests raping altar boys, If I were to make the case that all Christians are murderous pederasts and would-be child molesters I would be banned from this forum, and rightly so. The assertion would be vile, outrageous, and fraudulent.

You are trying to make the case that all Turks are that way, only more savage. In so doing you do not even take the first step of first establishing that the government is actively promoting these barbaric "honor killings," instead of trying to eliminate them.

Since you are merely interested in portraying the entire country as a bloodthirsty mob, I shall refrain from further comments, which would qute justifiably get me banned.

Hermann C. is playing bagpipes at full bore
With a ghastly roar.
"Thanks!" We're forced to holler,
"Take, oh, take this dollar,
And let us have no more."