It sometimes seems that human violence knows no bounds. Recent reports of the brutal honour killings of five Pakistani women have shocked the world. And the reactions from the Pakistani parliament do not do much to ease that shock. When a terrible event occurs, the world looks for explanations in order to begin to deal with it. And even then the shock, horror and disgust will remain, for this is a crime we will never be able to understand.
Honour killings have been a concern to human rights groups for several years. All these deaths are disturbing but these had a particularly cruel twist, with the woman being buried alive. Such inhumanity and disregard for human life suggests that the perpetrators felt these women did something terrible to deserve this punishment.
Their crime? Doing what women all over the world do every day; choosing their own husband to marry through a civil court, away from the traditions of their tribe. The tribal elders then ordered the abduction and shooting of these three teenagers and their two female relatives, who were then sent alive to their graves. And while a female politician attempted to bring the case to the government's attention, another spoke up in defence of the tribal chiefs who ordered it.
The mind boggles and the heart sinks. How could this be defended? And who would expect that the words to justify and explain this would come from a member of parliament? Pakistani teenage girls have long known that choosing independence could cost them their lives. And now they face the knowledge that their killers may be spoken up for at the highest level. Their families will be rendered helpless.
But we must not lose heart. If politicians in Pakistan and other countries where honour killings are practiced, are forced by their own electorate and the west to stop explaining these away simply as ‘tradition', then these women can be given hope, and these shockingly brutal deaths will not have been in vain.
