Amnesty International issued a public statement regarding the death sentence of an Iranian teenager:
On 3 January, 18-year-old Nazanin was sentenced to death for murder by a criminal court, after she reportedly admitted stabbing to death one of three men who attempted to rape her and her 16-year-old niece in a park in Karaj in March 2005. She was seventeen at the time. Her sentence is subject to review by the Court of Appeal, and if upheld, to confirmation by the Supreme Court. According to reports in the Iranian newspaper, Etemaad, Nazanin told the court that three men had approached her and her niece, forced them to the ground and tried to rape them. Seeking to defend her niece and herself, Nazanin stabbed one man in the hand with a knife that she possessed and then, when the men continued to pursue them, stabbed another of the men in the chest. She reportedly told the court I wanted to defend myself and my niece. I did not want to kill that boy. At the heat of the moment I did not know what to do because no one came to our help, but was nevertheless sentenced to death. [Link]
The court’s judgment has, to some, further exposed the unfairness of Islamic law with respect to women. As others have pointed out, Nazanin may have been unable to prove that she acted in self-defense because of certain evidentiary rules in Islamic law that place greater weight on the testimony of males.
The women asked, “O Allah’s Apostle! What is deficient in our intelligence and religion?” He said, “Is not the evidence of two women equal to the witness of one man?” They replied in the affirmative. He said, “This is the deficiency in her intelligence. [Link]
Accordiginly, Nazanin and her niece may have testified that the three men attempted to rape them, but the testimony of the two surviving men would have successfully refuted this claim.
(For those interested, there is an online petition to “save” Nazanin, which will be submitted to UN Secretary General Kofi Annan and others.)
The case has also reinvigorated the debate about whether the death penalty should be applied to teenagers (an issue the Supreme Court of the United States recently addressed in Roper v. Simmons), and whether capital punishment should be abolished entirely.
In India, rape is not punishable by death, however some have argued that the availability of capital punishment should extend to rape cases. Columnist Vir Sanghvi, for example, suggested that “rape is as bad as murder,” particularly because of the nature of Indian society:
It is almost impossible to recover and lead a normal life after you have been raped in India. First of all, you probably can’t talk about it. Secondly, in many cases, even when you do complain, no action is taken against the rapist. Thirdly, you are finished on the arranged marriage market and if you’re already married, your husband acts as though you are now shop soiled. And finally, far from being counselled to cope with the trauma of rape, you face a new trauma: society’s hostility. [Link]
On another note, my stint as a guest-blogger has come to an end. I again want to thank Abhi, Sajit, and the rest of the SM crew for allowing me to contribute to this blog. This site is the preeminent forum for desis and those interested in the stories, issues, and events relevant to our lives. To be able to participate in this manner was an honor. At the beginning of the month, I said:
I hope that I will able to present a unique perspective to certain issues and enrich the existing intellectual dynamic on this exceptional site. [Link]
I hope I’ve accomplished this, and to the extent that my entries fell short of this stated goal, I apologize.
The reaction to the apparent cyber-squatting demonstrates the importance of this forum to many individuals, including myself. (You should know that I was not aware of what was going on behind the scenes; in fact, on Thursday I sent an email expressing my disappointment to Abhi, and even last night I told Sajit what little I thought of “Happy Hippie”.)
This site serves not only as a marketplace of ideas, but as a reminder of how small the world truly is. Indeed, Sonny Caberwal of Tavalon is an old family friend. And, I had the pleasure of meeting Taz several years ago in LA. I hope that she will also benefit from this experience, and I’m confident that the SM readership will be as kind to her as it was to me.
With thanks, Dave
