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A Jordanian court charged a man on Monday with the premeditated murder of his sister after he confessed to stabbing her thirty-five times with a knife. He claims to have killed her to "cleanse the family's honour".
The 26-year-old man turned himself in to the authorities. He says he killed his older sister because she was pregnant eighteen months after becoming a widow.
In Jordan, premediated murder is punishable by death, but the courts often grant reduced sentences in cases of so-called honour killings.
Pro-democracy demonstrators in Jordan have brought down the government and, as an unintended consequence, put on hold discussion of a law that would punish any man who kills a female relative with a minimum twelve years in prison.
Rana Husseini, a Jordanian journalist and author of a book on the subject, discusses the ongoing battle to criminalise these murders.
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(1) Reaction
Rana Husseini
Thank you Brent and RFI for this very important interview!
Crimes like this need to be stopped! We all are individuals of the human race, deep down inside not that much different from one another...
Thank you Rana for taking your time to actually try to do something about this! We all should try to do what we can...
Anja S