{"id":18984,"date":"2013-01-08T19:16:34","date_gmt":"2013-01-08T18:16:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rt.com\/news\/yemen-wives-kill-husbands-576\/"},"modified":"2013-01-08T19:16:34","modified_gmt":"2013-01-08T18:16:34","slug":"black-widows-of-yemen-inequality-sparks-spate-of-husband-killings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/breaking-news\/black-widows-of-yemen-inequality-sparks-spate-of-husband-killings\/","title":{"rendered":"Black widows of Yemen: Inequality sparks spate of husband killings"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Most of the 50 Yemeni women accused of murder in 2012 were arrested for killing their husbands, the country\u2019s ministry of interior has announced. The killings are deemed by many a desperate reaction to rampant gender inequality in the country.<\/p>\n

The women were between the ages of 25-50 and had mostly carried out the crime with the aid of male relatives, a report released by the Yemeni Interior Ministry\u2019s Information Security Center revealed.<\/p>\n

Domestic violence, marriage inequality, jealousy, a sense of inferiority and economic pressures were cited as the primary motives. Most of the men were shot, poisoned, or beaten to death.<\/p>\n

The most infamous crime of this nature occurred in August in a village in the province of Marib, where a 40-year-old woman killed her husband and two sons following a domestic dispute, Dr. Mujib Abdul Bari, a specialist in psychiatric and neurological disorders, told AlArabiya.net.<\/p>\n

Bari said statistics relating to such crimes should be published to help facilitate public service campaigns which would help empower women in the country.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn case women have taken a wrong decision in marriage, they should resort to legal solutions, such as divorce or going back to their familie<\/em>s [who can] help them on a psychological level,\u201d<\/em> he continued.<\/p>\n

Despite the recent spike in violence committed by wives in 2012, nearly two times as many women were victims of attempted murder during the same period.<\/p>\n

Following the 1994 Yemeni Civil War, gender inequality has drastically increased in the country.<\/p>\n

In 1999, the minimum marriage age of 15 was scrapped. Subsequent attempts a decade later to introduce legislation requiring women to be 17-years or older, were halted by conservative parliamentarians, Rebecca Murray from IPS news agency reports.<\/p>\n

United Nations figures compiled in 2004 show 17.2% of girls aged 15-19 were either married, divorced or widowed.<\/p>\n

While sexual intercourse with girls who have not reached puberty is illegal under article 15 of the country\u2019s Personal Status Law, Human Rights Watch has documented cases where pre-pubescent girls have been subjected to marital rape.<\/p>\n

In Yemen, there are currently no laws on the books against marital rape. For those women trapped in abusive marriages, divorce laws reflect the extent of gender inequality in the country. While a husband can divorce his wife by simply repudiating her three times, a woman can only ask for a divorce under certain conditions- for example, if her husband fails to provide for the family financially even if he is capable of doing so. If a woman hopes to divorce for other reasons, she must file for a no-fault divorce which requires that she pay back her dowry.<\/p>\n

Custody of children is highly biased towards husbands, as men are considered the natural guardians of children, while women are viewed as physical custodians but have no legal rights.<\/p>\n

Rebecca Murray says domestic violence, health complications, a lack of education and career opportunities are often directly connected to early or forced marriages.<\/p>\n

She also cites Yemen\u2019s penal code as being heavily biased in favor of men who commit \u201chonor killings,\u201d with husbands who murder allegedly adulterous wives receiving a one-year maximum prison sentence, or even a fine.<\/p>\n

The World Economic Forum\u2019s Global Gender Gap Index in 2012, ranked Yemen\u2019s gender disparities last in economic, political, education and health criteria.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\n

Most of the 50 Yemeni women accused of murder in 2012 were arrested for killing their husbands, the country’s ministry of interior has announced. The killings are deemed by many a desperate reaction to rampant gender inequality in the country.<\/p>\n

The women were between the ages of 25-50 and had mostly carried out the crime with the aid of male relatives, a report released by the Yemeni Interior Ministry’s Information Security Center revealed.<\/p>\n

Domestic violence, marriage inequality, jealousy, a sense of inferiority and economic pressures were cited as the primary motives. Most of the men were shot, poisoned, or beaten to death.<\/p>\n

The most infamous crime of this nature occurred in August in a village in the province of Marib, where a 40-year-old woman killed her husband and two sons following a domestic dispute, Dr. Mujib Abdul Bari, a specialist in psychiatric and neurological disorders, told AlArabiya.net.<\/p>\n

Bari said statistics relating to such crimes should be published to help facilitate public service campaigns which would help empower women in the country.<\/p>\n

“In case women have taken a wrong decision in marriage, they should resort to legal solutions, such as divorce or going back to their familie<\/em>s [who can] help them on a psychological level,”<\/em> he continued.<\/p>\n

Despite the recent spike in violence committed by wives in 2012, nearly two times as many women were victims of attempted murder during the same period.<\/p>\n

Following the 1994 Yemeni Civil War, gender inequality has drastically increased in the country.<\/p>\n

In 1999, the minimum marriage age of 15 was scrapped.  Subsequent attempts  a decade later to introduce legislation requiring women to be 17-years or older, were halted by conservative parliamentarians, Rebecca Murray from IPS news agency reports.<\/p>\n

United Nations figures compiled in 2004 show 17.2% of girls aged 15-19 were either married, divorced or widowed.<\/p>\n

While sexual intercourse with girls who have not reached puberty is illegal under article 15 of the country’s Personal Status Law, Human Rights Watch has documented cases where pre-pubescent girls have been subjected to marital rape.<\/p>\n

In Yemen, there are currently no laws on the books against  marital rape. For those women trapped in abusive marriages, divorce laws reflect the extent of gender inequality in the country. While a husband can divorce his wife by simply repudiating her three times, a woman can only ask for a divorce under certain conditions- for example, if her husband fails to provide for the family financially even if he is capable of doing so. If a woman hopes to divorce for other reasons, she must file for a no-fault divorce which requires that she pay back her dowry.<\/p>\n

Custody of children is highly biased towards husbands, as men are considered the natural guardians of children, while women are viewed as physical custodians but have no legal rights.<\/p>\n

Rebecca Murray says domestic violence, health complications, a lack of education and career opportunities are often directly connected to early or forced marriages.<\/p>\n

She also cites Yemen’s penal code as being heavily biased in favor of men who commit “honor killings,” with husbands who murder allegedly adulterous wives receiving a one-year maximum prison sentence, or even a fine.<\/p>\n

The World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Index in 2012, ranked Yemen’s gender disparities last in economic, political, education and health criteria.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1213,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[487],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-18984","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-breaking-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18984","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1213"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18984"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18984\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18984"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18984"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18984"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}