Jordanian charged with killing his sister for bad reputation

A man in Jordan is charged with killing his divorced sister with bad reputation to cleanse the family honor.

Photo: Jordanian charged with killing his sister for bad reputation

The official who spoke on the customary condition of anonymity because he was not allowed to speak to the press, said the 29-year-old man had allegedly beaten his 33-year-old sibling on the head and strangled her with a scarf in her parents home in an Amman suburb, at dawn on Thursday.

Afterwards, the man headed to the nearest police station and turned himself in saying he had killed his sister to cleanse his family's honor because she had a bad reputation.

The suspect said he acted alone without his family's knowledge, discovering his sister's whereabouts, planning her killing and then lured her to the family's house by telling her that her parents wanted to see her.

The official did not provide the names of the individuals and a trial date has not been set.

The victim was the 13th woman killed in the kingdom this year in a so-called honor crime.

In Jordan, an average of 20 women are killed by male relatives each year in these honor killings. Men have the final say in all family matters in this conservative Muslim society, where many consider sex out of wedlock an indelible stain on a family's reputation.

Some women in conservative circles of society have been killed simply for dating.

International human rights organizations have condemned honor killings in Jordan and appealed to the country's ruler, King Abdullah II, to put an end to the practice.

The government subsequently abolished a section in the penal code that allowed "honor" killers to get sentences as lenient as six months. Judges often commute sentences in honor killing cases, especially if family members drop the charges.

The government has urged judges to consider honor killings equal to other homicides, punishable with up to 15 years in prison.

But attempts to introduce harsher sentences for honor killings have been blocked in Jordan's parliament, where the predominantly conservative Bedouin lawmakers argue that lesser penalties would lead to tolerating adultery.