Nezara has lived with her husband and four children in Berlin-Neukölln since the late 1980s. He works as a driver, she as a cleaner. They also have a teenage cousin, Magid, who lives with them. When the husband dies of cancer, his Afghan family demands that she marry his brother Badshah.
read Nezara's storyThere is almost nothing to find about this old case: On April 26, 2001, a Kosovar Albanian takes a cab to his divorced wife. He shoots her, her friend, her boss and himself. He dies, as does the girlfriend. The ex-wife and her boss survive badly wounded.
read Klea's storyFunda is 18 years old, has a high school diploma and is training to be a hairdresser. Her father Mikdat is a religious but unremarkable man. He promises his daughter to a 24-year-old cousin from Ankara. Funda, however, refuses to marry him.
read Funda's storyOn October 11, 2001, a 20-year-old Yazidi Turk shoots 2 doctor's assistants in their practice. One is his ex-girlfriend Ina, who had broken up with him 2 months earlier. The other is her colleague Annegret, named Hanni.
read Ina's storyPenelope is a saleswoman in a bakery and married for 7 years to a Sicilian with whom she has a son who is 6 years old at the time of the crime. She gets a divorce and moves in with her mother. Her ex-husband starts stalking her.
read Penelope's storyNihal's case is hardly documented. She is probably an import bride who had to quit her job in Turkey in 1982 to go to Germany for marriage under duress. Her husband Ismail deals in satellite equipment.
read Nihal's storyNihal's case is hardly documented. She is probably an import bride who had to quit her job in Turkey in 1982 to go to Germany for marriage under duress. Her husband Ismail deals in satellite equipment.
read Hülya's storyMariam comes to Germany in 1981 with her parents and older brother and later studies pharmacy. At the age of 19 she marries Nasir, an Afghan who has been living in Hamburg for several years. The marriage lasts only a few months, after which she wants a divorce.
read Mariam's storyThis crime is not a typical honor killing. Yet honor is the driving force behind the story. Buhpendraroy is from India and comes to Germany illegally via the Netherlands in 1987. Through marriage he obtains a German passport in 1992.
read Steven's storyIn 2000, Mirjana's parents divorce in the former Yugoslavia. Mother and daughter move to Berlin and live together in a flat in Spandau. The father, Zivota Pantic, remains in his homeland. He is an Orthodox Christian.
read Mirjana's storyBirsen was born and raised in Germany. Yet her parents marry her off to a cousin from Turkey. In February 2002, he came to Germany from his Anatolian village (where he herded his family's sheep).
read Birsen's storyUlerika came to Germany with her parents as a two-year-old in 1989. She grows up near Tübingen, is well integrated and is even elected school representative. Her father Latif sees his family honor tarnished by her Western lifestyle.
read Ulerika's storyFunda is married and has 3 children. She had one when she was 17, indicating a forced marriage. The couple separates, the father moves out of the apartment. Funda's brother-in-law Orhan is an asylum seeker from Turkey.
read Funda's storyNothing would be known about this honor killing if not for the aftermath: In December 2008, 19-year-old Rasit Y. stabbed his father to death in his sleep to avenge the murder of his mother. Both acts happened in the same apartment.
read Ayse's storyWith 66 knife stabs, Cetin kills his ex-girlfriend Katrin in Münster in early April 2003. She lives in Münster, her real name and nationality are not known. She is believed to be German. The police find the body in the Steinfurter Bagno recreation area.
read Katrin's storyBurin is an asylum seeker from Kosovo and lives in Hamburg. His brother lives with his wife and child (or children) in Übach-Palenberg near Aachen. During a visit, an argument ensues. Burin suspects that his brother's wife is having an affair and is thus cheating on his brother.
read Ariana's storyTürel comes from a modern Turkish family and marries at her own request within a conservative clan. At the beginning of her marriage, she must wear a headscarf and is not allowed to work, even though she is trained as a saleswoman in retail or industry.
read Türel's storyMustafa came to Germany at the age of 12 and married a Turkish saleswoman in 1994. Their daughter was born the following year. In 2002, the woman meets a married Turkish pallet trader from Delmenhorst, also named Mustafa. He helps her - it is said - to record a CD as a singer.
read Mustafa's storyMehmood comes to Germany as a construction worker in 1985 and brings his wife and 5 children from Pakistan in 2000. When his daughter Farzana is 20, she secretly goes to Pakistan and marries her childhood sweetheart.
read Farzana's storyIn April 2003, Alyin and Ali were married. The two are cousins, so a forced or arranged marriage is likely. The marriage gives Ali the opportunity to come to Germany. He is an imported groom. However, he does not learn German and only works occasionally.
read Aylin's storyThis murder is not clearly an honor killing, at least not a typical one. As far as is known, 20-year-old Baris has sexual intercourse with 14-year-old Filis. Some articles say she is Turkish, others Macedonian.
read Filis' storyIn the summer of 2001, Ramona and Mohammed entered into an imam marriage, i.e. a religious union that is not recognized as a marriage in Germany. They have two small sons. The father is violent.
read Ramona's storyThis honor killing is a murder of a man. It is rare, but it occurs. It begins with Özhan's sister Filiz Kepenek and her husband (who have two children together) seeking an amicable divorce. Both already have new partners.
read Kemal's storyIn 1998 Mahmut and Stefanie (some newspapers write Steffanie) get married. This gives Mahmut the right to stay. However, he does not have a German passport. Stefanie brings a daughter with her into the marriage. The two have a second daughter.
read Stefanie's storySemra grows up in Berlin. Her mother dies in 1994, a month later her father remarries. Possibly the new wife does not accept Semra. She is treated like a house slave. To get rid of her, the father marries Semra to her cousin Cengiz when she is 12 (possibly by phone).
read Semra's storyMelek E. is already divorced when she meets Selahattin. It is suspected that he wants to marry her to get a residence permit in Germany. He had previously entered the country illegally. But he knows that his wife is living a modern life in Berlin.
read Melek's storyNothing would be known about this case if the ZDF program Aktenzeichen XY Ungelöst had not reported on it in 2007. In the 1970s, a Moroccan comes to Germany as a guest worker and takes his wife Karima with him. 3 children are born in Wuppertal: 2 girls, 1 boy.
read Karima's storyShortly before her 18th birthday, Mariann moves in with Samir. The Iraqi immediately breaks contact with her family. He pressures her to marry him in Denmark, which she does. This is because Samir's asylum application was rejected in 2000.
read Martina's storyMeryem Ö. and Mahmut S. (both Kurds) live in an imam marriage. This religious marriage is not officially recognized in Germany and Turkey. It is not known why the two were not officially married via civil marriage.
read Meryem's storyAt the age of 15, Hatun Sürücü is married off to a cousin in Turkey by her Kurdish family, who live in Berlin. Two years later she divorces and returns to Berlin pregnant. She takes off her headscarf, finishes school and attends a technical college.
read Hatun's storyIn the mid-1980s, Ahmed lived temporarily with his then best friend Mustafa. During this time, he allegedly sexually abused his host's two underage daughters for years. He never spoke about it.
read Ahmed's storyHakan was born in Munich in 1982 and grew up with his grandparents in Izmir, Turkey. He returned to Munich when he was 10 years old. His parents' marriage broke up. The mother flees to a women's shelter a few times.
read Tugba's storyWe wouldn't have found this attempted honor killing at all if it hadn't come back to the newspapers in 2018. At the time, Lezime lived with her disabled son Liridon (now 27 years old) in a flat in Hanover. Fearing for the husband, they bought a fighting dog.
read Lezime's storyGönül (in some reports she is called Gülcan) Karabey was born in Turkey and came to Germany at the age of six. At the age of 16 she is married off at the Turkish consulate. Later, the Turkish husband leaves for Italy, so the marriage cannot be dissolved.
read Gönül's storyMarko is 22 years old, from Croatia, works as a salesman in Munich and has a German passport. He is known to the police for drug offenses and assault. He lives with Kristine. The relationship is violent, but the two also run a sham company with more than 130,000 euros in the account.
read Kristine's storyDuring a study visit to Italy, Regina meets her future husband, Albanian Agim E.. The two fall in love, live together for a few years (probably unremarkably) and have a daughter. She works as a language teacher, he occasionally as a waiter or kitchen help.
read Regina's storyFew victims of honor killings are men. But the motive for an honor killing is always the alleged sexual misconduct (or indeed self-determination) of the woman. Tamer, a Turk, lives separated from his wife but won't accept that she has a new boyfriend.
read Mustafa's storyIn August 2005 Katja breaks up with her boyfriend, with whom she had lived for five years. The abandoned man then harasses her for months and threatens to kill her. The couple have a son together and Katja has another child from a previous relationship.
read Katja's storyGülperi's father orders his 16-year-old son to kill his sister Gülperi. The reason: she refuses to marry an unknown cousin from Turkey. Although the murder is not carried out, Gülperi's story is found in this archive.
read Gülperi's storyFatma and Attila come from the same Turkish province and are "promised" to each other in a kind of forced child marriage. First Attila moves to Germany and works as a welder in a shipyard. He is given a German passport.
read Fatma's storyMost honor killers have no sense of guilt. For them, the laws of the clan are above the laws of the state. The killer of 24-year-old Kurdish woman Sazan even stressed in court that he was proud of his act.
read Sazan's storySevgi was born in Germany and raised in Wiesbaden. She is graduating from the Realschule and is doing an internship as a legal assistant. She is believed to have been married off to a relative on New Year's Eve 2000/2001 during a vacation in Turkey.
read Sevgi's storyWhat is an honour killing? An honour killing is a murder in the name of…
What is an honour killing? An honour killing is a murder in the name of…
Source: 03-04-2025 stopfemicideiran.org: StopFemicideIran (SFI) publishes report on femicides in Iran in 2024
What is an honour killing? An honour killing is a murder in the name of…
What is an honour killing? An honour killing is a murder in the name of…
What is an honour killing? An honour killing is a murder in the name of…