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01 Oct 2006
The Iranian Students News Agency’s legal correspondent reports, “The judge at Branch 71 of Tehran’s Criminal Court ruled, after deliberations and with majority opinion, that a man accused of murdering his wife be sentenced to three years in prison. According to charges laid against the 80-year old Eivaz on October 1 of last year, Eivaz had a confrontation with his wife Kobra, striking her in the head with a metal rod. Kobra was immediately taken to a hospital but subsequently died. During the proceedings, Eivaz said in his defense, ‘my wife was 30 years younger than me, and for 14 years she was no obedient to me. At the night of the incident we had a confrontation and I was carrying a rod, which I had brought from the gym. It suddenly fell off my hands and hit her in the head.’ The judge asked the defendant, ‘if the rod fell from your hands, then why did it hit your wife 3 times?’ The defendant responded, ‘I just struck once, I don’t know why she was hit in the head 3 times. She was not obedient to me for 14 years. I did not intend to kill her. I just wanted to discipline her so that she would be obidient.”
It is evident that the legal code in Iran, despite its shortcomings and insensitivity to the female gender, does not allow a husband to murder his wife because she is not obedient to her husband and his sexual desires. Based on current laws, a woman who is not obedient to her husband loses her rights to a minimum living wage, which the husband is obliged to provide under normal circumstances. For a large segment of Iranian women, who do are dependent on their husbands’ income, obedience (be it sexual or emotional) is in essence the only way of subsisting. This unfair situation will endure until the government enacts policies that ensure women’s financial independence; policies that go far beyond failed attempts at enforcing dowries and other traditional forms of social security. The case mentioned above is not a unique case in Iran’s justice system. We have seen many similar cases. Such things occurred even before the revolution. Women were indirectly forced to be obedient to their husbands so that they could maintain a minimum, and at times torturous, standard of living. Never have oil-rich rulers of Iran enacted programs that provided social insurance and protection of women, though they have often talked about it as a ploy to garnish support.
Hence, even though the law is cruel, and from today’s standpoint forced sexual relations are known to be inhuman and constitute “sexual abuse,” the political, social and economic situation of women is such that husbands have taken it to be an obvious right to murder their wives should they refuse to be obedient to their wishes!
Eivaz, who had a 30 year age difference with his wife, and who always used his physical strength to force his wife into bed, exploited all of the legal, economic and political shortcomings of the country. He knew too well that under the law of retribution he could pay a meager fine and appease his wife’s family – who probably agreed to this marriage because of their economic situation in the first place. The honorable judge probably did the most he could, sentencing Eivaz to three years imprisonment. Essentially, Eivaz will either not get imprisoned or will serve for less than three years. Then he will use anti-women laws and traditions once again to force another poor and desperate girl into submission.
It needs not be mentioned that sexual abuse does not always lead to murder among partners. But the continuation of this trend inflicts deep psychological and sexual wounds on Iranian women. I got to know many of these women during my time as a lawyer. They often came to seek legal help and rid themselves from the web of sexual abuse. They never found appropriate answers. I was in disbelief to hear some judges say that the sexual abuse of a wife has no legal limitations. “The woman is like a beautiful garden which has two doors. The husband can enter from either door as he wishes!” In this legal, cultural and economic hell, Iranian woman have been trapped. What can be
done?
This artilce was Published on the Rooz online newspaper.
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