The young man poses proudly, smiling, in front of the camera which films him strolling in a street of Ahvaz, in the south-west of Iran. In his right hand, a long knife he holds nonchalantly. In his left hand, the head of his 17-year-old wife, whom he has just beheaded. The excruciating video, posted on YouTube and relayed by the Rokna news agency on Saturday February 5, portrays the trivialized horror and brutality of endemic violence against Iranian women.
Mona (Ghazal) Heidari’s story is like that of thousands of others. According to the Women Committee NCRI, a committee for the defense of Iranian women, she had been forcibly married at age 12 to her cousin, Sajjad Heidari. In Iran, the law authorizes the marriage of girls from the age of 13, or even earlier in some cases, if the father requests it. Nearly 9,750 girls, aged 10 to 14, are affected by early marriage in the country, according to The Orient-The Daywhich recalls that these forced unions increased by 30% in the second quarter of 2021 compared to the previous year.
Mona Heidari, a victim of domestic violence for years, fled to Turkey a few months ago to escape her husband, before returning a few days ago. It is this journey, without her husband’s knowledge and without his permission, who allegedly caused the murder, according to the newspaper Etemad. The Iranian media do not all deliver the same version of the reasons which motivated the return to Iran of the young woman, mother of a 3-year-old child. But everyone agrees that she joined the long list of victims of “honour killing”.
“No fear of existing laws”
These murders, perpetrated by men on female relatives to punish them for having “discredited” their relatives, are numerous in Iran. The women who are victims have refused to marry by force, have been victims of rape, have divorced, have tried to leave their husband or have had relations with a man other than their husband.
In 2020, the magazine The Lancet noted that 20% of murders and 50% of family murders in East Azerbaijan, a northern province of Iran, were “honour killings”. According to the magazine, 8,000 such murders were committed in Iran between 2010 and 2014. The Iranian daily Sharq gave, in 2019, figures oscillating between 375 and 450 per year.
Iranian law is regularly denounced as institutionalizing misogyny and the country’s patriarchal culture
“The social construction of honor as a value system, norm or tradition is the main justification for violence perpetrated against women”, writing The Lancet. Iranian law is, indeed, regularly denounced as being the institutionalization of misogyny and the patriarchal culture of the country. “In some parts of the country where the patriarchal and tribal system reigns, men brutally beat their wives, daughters or sisters without having any fear of the existing laws”, relief Hamshahri, Tehran City Hall’s publication, translated by International mail.
Under the Islamic penal code, a man can, for example, kill his wife and her lover if he surprises them. “in the act of adultery”. A father, considered as “owner” of the blood of his children, will not be punished with the death penalty either, as the law of Talion provides, if he kills one of his children.
For defenders of human rights and women’s rights, these laws are the source of a feeling of impunity enjoyed by many men, and the breeding ground for crimes of which women are the main victims. “The authorities have not taken measures to end the impunity of men who kill their wives or daughters or to ensure that they are punished commensurate with the gravity of their crime”emphasizes Amnesty International in its latest report.
Wave of indignation
The murder of Mona Heidari sparked outrage across the country, including from reformist media and women’s rights activists, reports International mail. “There are no concrete measures to ensure the application of laws aimed at preventing violence against women”regretted MP Elham Nadaf, quoted by the Ilna news agency.
The murder also rekindled calls for reform of the law protecting women against domestic violence. The newspaper Sazandegi thus put the drama on its “one”, urging the government and the justice system to “support women and girls by reforming laws regarding child marriage and specifically criminalizing crimes committed by bigoted men.”
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Ensieh Khazali, vice president for women and family affairs in the Iranian government, also called for immediate parliamentary action to “close some of the legal gaps” and “raise the level of consciousness of the population”.
The coming to power, in August 2021, of ultra-conservative President Ebrahim Raïssi, has further diminished the hope of seeing the pressure of power and clerics on the women of this country, one of the few in the world not not have signed the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women.
