(Feb. 5) – Honor killings are not something new to many people in Turkey. But the death of a 16-year-old girl who was buried alive for talking to boys has been revealed to be a particularly gruesome killing and has stirred strong reactions.
"The autopsy result is bloodcurdling," an unidentified official told the Anatolia news agency Thursday, Agence France-Press reported. "According to our findings, the girl -- who had no bruises on her body and no sign of narcotics or poison in her blood -- was alive and fully conscious when she was buried."
The girl's father and grandfather are to be put on trial for burying her alive, reportedly because they thought her friendship with boys had brought shame and dishonor to the family.
The body of Medine Memi was found in a sitting position with hands tied in a 6½-foot hole under a chicken coop at the family house in Kahta in southeast Turkey. Police discovered the body following a tip-off 40 days after she went missing, the agency said.
According to a postmortem examination, the agency added, the girl's lungs and stomach contained significant amounts of soil, confirming she was alive when she was buried.
The girl had repeatedly tried to tell the police that she had been beaten by her father and grandfather, the London Times reported today. "She tried to take refuge at the police station three times, and she was sent home three times," her mother, Immihan, said after the body was discovered in December.
The girl's father, the Times added, was reported as saying at the time, "She has male friends. We are uneasy about that."
Reaction to the killing was particularly strong in remarks posted on the Web site of a religious television channel, Samanyolu, the London paper reported.
"The punishment for whosoever should kill with intent is the hell where he will languish forever," one poster said, adding, "Allah has cursed him and prepared great pain for him."
Another comment on the site said, "You named your daughter after the holy city of Medina but your mind is left over from the earlier Age of Ignorance."
Honor killings are most prevalent in Turkey's predominantly Kurdish southeast, the Anatolia agency said. But the practice has spread to cities and even abroad, largely through migration, with cases reported in the U.S. and U.K.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article7015758.ece
