Syrien: 300 æresdrab på kvinder hvert år.

For at sætte det i perspektiv, så anslår FN, at der foretages op mod 5.000 æresdrab på piger og kvinder om året.

Up to three hundred women are killed each year in Syria for "motives of honour" by their family members, with the full approval of relatives. As was the case of the two young sisters who had their throats slit by their brother in Al-Qamishli, a town in north-eastern Syria along the Turkish border, earlier this month. Both breastfeeding new mums, the victims were suspected by their male sibling of having extramarital affairs, according to Syrian Women Observatory website, which notes that in Syria, with an estimated population of 20 million, about half of the murders committed each year are against women, around 200-300 each year...

Honour is a core value in the Arab-Islamic societies. This helps explain the extreme and violent behaviour used to protect it. Such an example was the September 2005 murder of a young Druze woman, Huda Abu 'Asali, by members of her family in southern Syria.

The crime - provoked by her marriage to a man outside her ethnic group - sparked outrage and prompted the independent local website ''Syrian Women" to launch a sweeping campaign with the support of Syrian Muslim and Christian clerics as well attorneys, intellectuals, and ordinary citizens. The main goal of the campaign is to ammend various articles of the Syrian penal code which grant immunity or slashed sentences to men who murder female relatives. Local human rights advocate Bassam al-Kadi says discussion of honour killing was banned in the Syrian media until two years ago...

Social Affairs and Labour Minister Diala Hajj Aref recently declared that honour crimes were "rare incidents" blown out of proportion by the media. Two days later, teenager Salam Shiekmous Dokko was killed by her brother, who suspected her of dating a young man. The medical examiner found she was a virgin.

Kilder:

• ANSA 26/4 2007: Syria on razor´s edge with honour killings