2007年VOA标准英语-Honor Killings Fuel Tensions in Iraq's Kurdish

By Barry Newhouse
Irbil
08 May 2007

In Iraq's northern Kurdistan region, government officials are trying to understand and stop a rise in honor killings². The Kurdish government has overturned Iraqi laws that allowed relatives to kill women who were perceived to have dishonored their families, but officials say women are still dying nearly every day. VOA's Barry Newhouse reports from Irbil that, in recent weeks, a widely distributed video of one brutal³ killing¹ has fueled more deaths and inflamed⁴ sectarian tensions.

A still taken from cell phone video of the honor killing of Do'a Khalil

In the grainy video, a dozen men surround a woman curled into a fetal position on the ground, and they kick and punch her. Hundreds of onlookers⁵ fill the village square in Bashika, just outside Iraq's northern city Mosul.

The beating continues as Do'a Khalil, 17, tries to protect her head from the blows. After several minutes, a cinderblock is passed through the crowd and a man uses it to smash her head. 

Khalil's death brings cheers from the crowd.

Do'a Khalil belonged to the Yazidis, a religious minority concentrated in northern Iraq with a strict caste system governing marriage. She was in love with a Muslim boy. Members of her family disapproved⁶.

The video of her murder on April 7 quickly spread from cell phone to cell phone across Kurdistan, dominating news coverage⁷ and stoking tensions between Yazidis and Muslims.

Ido Babasheikh, an advisor⁸ on Yazidi affairs for Iraq's President Jalal Talabani, showed VOA printouts from Islamist Web sites urging attacks against Yazidis.

"The fundamentalists, the Muslimists, they have taken this argument to kill the Yazidians," he said. "They have written many articles and they said they must kill the Yazidians because they killed a girl, this girl who wanted to change her religion."

Kurdish officials insist that the girl did not want to convert to Islam and that her family was merely upset because she wanted to marry outside her religion.

But days after her death, 23 Yazidi laborers⁹ traveling together were shot dead in Mosul. An Islamic militant¹⁰ group claimed responsibility and vowed¹¹ to kill more Yazidis to avenge¹² her death.

Do'a Khalil's public honor killing was unusual because hundreds of people witnessed it and the video has been seen by thousands. But honor killings are common in Kurdistan, where tribal¹³, cultural and religious traditions have long condoned¹⁴ the practice.

Yousif Aziz is the minister of human rights in the Kurdistan regional government.

"I think it takes place daily, some are killed, some burn themselves, so there are many cases," said Aziz.

Accurate figures on the number of women killed are difficult to obtain because many deaths occur at home and go unreported.

Some women are distraught over dishonoring their families and set themselves on fire using fuel. Their deaths are frequently ruled an accident. Officials say hundreds of women are dying each year, and the limited figures available show deaths are increasing.

In the latest United Nations human-rights report on Iraq, U.N. officials urged the Kurdistan government to do more to address the problem.

A protest march by women's rights groups calling on government to take action on honor killings following death of Do'a

Chilura Hardi, who runs a center for women's issues in Irbil, says that as the cell phone video of Do'a Khalil's killing spread, the number of honor killings increased.

"Since the seventh of April, so many women have been killed. So many women, it has just been packed, packed with killing women," she said. "Because it just made it okay. When people saw that, people who have got this idea about killing a woman for whatever the reason: whether she did not listen to you, did not obey your orders, did not want to get married to so and so. Well then, if that happens then I can do the same thing."

She says she believes the government is sincere in its effort to solve the problem. Kurdish officials have enacted¹⁵ laws that punish the practice and they are starting a community education program they say reduced the number of honor killings in Pakistan.

But the killing of Do'a Khalil has brought renewed attention to the issue. Last week, nearly a month after Khalil was killed, the Kurdish government released a statement condemning¹⁶ her murder and urging calm. Hardi says women's groups have been alarmed by her death.

"We have been working on the killings for a long time. All of us, all of the women's organizations. We have been writing articles in the papers, on magazines. It just does not seem to get somewhere. Now when this happened I think it woke us all up and said, 'Look, if you do not do something, this is going to continue and it is going to get worse," added Hardi.

In recent weeks, Kurdish officials have also focused on reducing religious tensions sparked by Khalil's death.

Human Rights Minister Yousif Aziz says officials worry that Islamic militant groups are using her honor killing to ignite the kind of sectarian violence that plagues the rest of Iraq.

"These are one of the weak habits of the Kurdish community, and we have to take care about these weak points," said Aziz. "We should not allow our enemy to take advantage of these weak points and to make many problems for us."

Do'a Khalil has been buried in a Yazidi graveyard¹⁷ in a village north of Mosul, but the struggle over the legacy¹⁸ of her death continues.

1 killing   

n.巨额利润；突然赚大钱，发大财

参考例句：

• Investors are set to make a killing from the sell-off.投资者准备清仓以便大赚一笔。
• Last week my brother made a killing on Wall Street.上个周我兄弟在华尔街赚了一大笔。

2 killings   

谋杀( killing的名词复数 )； 突然发大财，暴发

参考例句：

• His statement was seen as an allusion to the recent drug-related killings. 他的声明被视为暗指最近与毒品有关的多起凶杀案。
• The government issued a statement condemning the killings. 政府发表声明谴责这些凶杀事件。

3 brutal   

adj.残忍的，野蛮的，不讲理的

参考例句：

• She has to face the brutal reality.她不得不去面对冷酷的现实。
• They're brutal people behind their civilised veneer.他们表面上温文有礼，骨子里却是野蛮残忍。

4 inflamed   

adj.发炎的，红肿的v.（使）变红，发怒，过热( inflame的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• His comments have inflamed teachers all over the country. 他的评论激怒了全国教师。
• Her joints are severely inflamed. 她的关节严重发炎。 来自《简明英汉词典》

5 onlookers   

n.旁观者，观看者( onlooker的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• A crowd of onlookers gathered at the scene of the crash. 在撞车地点聚集了一大群围观者。
• The onlookers stood at a respectful distance. 旁观者站在一定的距离之外，以示尊敬。

6 disapproved   

v.不赞成( disapprove的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• My parents disapproved of my marriage. 我父母不赞成我的婚事。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• She disapproved of her son's indiscriminate television viewing. 她不赞成儿子不加选择地收看电视。 来自《简明英汉词典》

7 coverage   

n.报导，保险范围，保险额，范围，覆盖

参考例句：

• There's little coverage of foreign news in the newspaper.报纸上几乎没有国外新闻报道。
• This is an insurance policy with extensive coverage.这是一项承保范围广泛的保险。

8 advisor   

n.顾问，指导老师，劝告者

参考例句：

• They employed me as an advisor.他们聘请我当顾问。
• The professor is engaged as a technical advisor.这位教授被聘请为技术顾问。

9 laborers   

n.体力劳动者，工人( laborer的名词复数 )；（熟练工人的）辅助工

参考例句：

• Laborers were trained to handle 50-ton compactors and giant cranes. 工人们接受操作五十吨压土机和巨型起重机的训练。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》
• Wage-labour rests exclusively on competition between the laborers. 雇佣劳动完全是建立在工人的自相竞争之上的。 来自英汉非文学 - 共产党宣言

10 militant   

adj.激进的，好斗的；n.激进分子，斗士

参考例句：

• Some militant leaders want to merge with white radicals.一些好斗的领导人要和白人中的激进派联合。
• He is a militant in the movement.他在那次运动中是个激进人物。

11 vowed   

起誓，发誓（vow的过去式与过去分词形式）

参考例句：

• He vowed quite solemnly that he would carry out his promise. 他非常庄严地发誓要实现他的诺言。
• I vowed to do more of the cooking myself. 我发誓自己要多动手做饭。

12 avenge   

v.为...复仇，为...报仇

参考例句：

• He swore to avenge himself on the mafia.他发誓说要向黑手党报仇。
• He will avenge the people on their oppressor.他将为人民向压迫者报仇。

13 tribal   

adj.部族的，种族的

参考例句：

• He became skilled in several tribal lingoes.他精通几种部族的语言。
• The country was torn apart by fierce tribal hostilities.那个国家被部落间的激烈冲突弄得四分五裂。

14 condoned   

v.容忍，宽恕，原谅( condone的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• Terrorism can never be condoned. 决不能容忍恐怖主义。
• They condoned his sins because he repented. 由于他的悔悟，他们宽恕了他的罪。 来自辞典例句

15 enacted   

制定（法律），通过（法案）( enact的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• legislation enacted by parliament 由议会通过的法律
• Outside in the little lobby another scene was begin enacted. 外面的小休息室里又是另一番景象。 来自英汉文学 - 嘉莉妹妹

16 condemning   

v.（通常因道义上的原因而）谴责( condemn的现在分词 )；宣判；宣布…不能使用；迫使…陷于不幸的境地

参考例句：

• The government issued a statement condemning the killings. 政府发表声明谴责这些凶杀事件。
• I concur with the speaker in condemning what has been done. 我同意发言者对所做的事加以谴责。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》

17 graveyard   

n.坟场

参考例句：

• All the town was drifting toward the graveyard.全镇的人都象流水似地向那坟场涌过去。
• Living next to a graveyard would give me the creeps.居住在墓地旁边会使我毛骨悚然。

18 legacy   

n.遗产，遗赠；先人(或过去)留下的东西

参考例句：

• They are the most precious cultural legacy our forefathers left.它们是我们祖先留下来的最宝贵的文化遗产。
• He thinks the legacy is a gift from the Gods.他认为这笔遗产是天赐之物。