SHELTER GIVES STRENGTH TO WOMEN

December 12, 2003 - (IRIN) Like couples the world over, 33-year-old Hasmiyah and Ali fell in love three years ago and wanted to get married. Hasmiyah’s family refused to accept Ali as a good husband for her, because she is a Sunni and he is Shi'ah, members respectively of the two dominant Muslim sects in the country. Then the problems started.

Hasmiyah is a pseudonym to protect the woman from her family, since she said if they knew where she was, they would track her down and kill her.
The couple ran away to Kirkuk in northern Iraq to get married. Not knowing where to turn for help after the marriage, Hasmiyah went to a women’s centre office affiliated to the Baghdad-based Organisation for Women’s Freedom in Iraq (OWFI), where she started working as an advocate for other women like her. Because northern Iraq was physically separated from southern Iraq by the international "no-fly zone", the two did not travel back to the capital until after the fall of former President Saddam Hussein this spring.

"I’m from a conservative family that follows shari'ah law," Hasmiyah told IRIN. "They have been looking for me for three years, so my husband and I are both in danger. Maybe he will be killed if my family sees him," she said.

The couple were now living in a secret women’s shelter together with other women in danger of being killed by their families if they were found, said Layla Muhammad, an OWFI spokeswoman. The house was opened just a few months ago by OWFI with help from the American Friends Organisation.

Under the former regime, women whose husbands were killed, who got divorced, who were raped or beaten were expected to be taken care of by their families. Often, returning to one's relatives in such a conservative society was an untenable course, Hasmiyah explained, so women ended up out on the street, begging with their children, or as prostitutes. In many cases, it was family members who committed the crimes against the women, she said. "If a woman commits a sin, she can be killed. Even though I feel scared, I like to work here, because I want to help women."

However, it was not easy to help any woman who violated the societal norms obtaining in Iraq, even when she had nowhere else to go, Layla told IRIN. The OWFI had been threatened by families of women and by mullahs and imams critical of its work, she said. "There is no law or system here for women’s rights," she said. "The world ignores everything about the woman. She has been ignored in the past."

Creating a shelter is the first step towards helping women victims get back on their feet. Traditional shari'ah law recognised by the former regime
contained no provision to protect female victims of violence, Layla. Families might kill a woman relative they felt had dishonoured them, even if whatever had happened, such as a rape, was not her fault.

Under the former regime, a man who committed such an "honour killing" would only be jailed for six months, Layla said. Women’s groups in northern Iraq had collected documents showing that more than 5,000 honour killings had been perpetrated in Iraq between 1991 and 2003.

Many times women had been shot or beaten to death, she said. "We knew there are many problems in this society. We have been told that there are kidnappings and rapes and honour killings. In such a violent environment, it is hard even to talk to women about basic rights."

OWFI also distributes humanitarian aid to poor people - hygiene kits with basic items like soap and feminine products. After gaining their trust, Layla calls meetings for the women, where issues such as domestic violence and basic human rights are discussed.

"You should get respect from your family, you should be allowed to go to school, you should be allowed to raise your voice against anything bad that might happen to you, to demonstrate or protest," Layla said. As more people learned about her group, she said, she hoped they would feel more comfortable in coming forward and taking advantage of the women’s shelter.

She believed Iraqi people were progressive, but that over the past 35 years, the Ba'thists and conservative religious leaders had held up social progress. She said that having been brought up in what she called a "radical" family, whose members belonged to the Iraqi Communist Party, girls and boys were treated the same, and this had helped her to be strong in speaking up for women’s rights in the country.

"I started to build my work so I could fight even with the men on this," Layla said. "We’re ready to welcome any woman. I will not let anyone touch them."