The murder of a Turkish woman and the applauding of
the crime by some students have left Berlin shaken and
officials pushing for ethics class. But how deep does
the concept of honor run among some immigrant
communities?
On a cold afternoon this week, Hatin Sürücü gazed
gravely from a large poster behind a bus stop lined
with flowers, cards and candles.
To the people who came to this bleak part of Berlin's
Tempelhof district for Tuesday's solemn vigil --
called not by the city's Muslim community but a gay
and lesbian organization -- the image of the young
woman in a headscarf, a baby in her arms, was familiar
from newspapers and television. A few notes at the
memorial read, "Hope you get a better deal in your
next life," and "Live a life on your own terms."
"It's a scandal," said Ali K, 33. "All Muslims in
Berlin should take to the streets to protest."
Yasemin, 22, said, "It's horrific. All Hatin was doing
was leading her life the way she wanted."
But it was a choice she paid for with her life. On
Feb. 7, 23-year-old Hatin Sürücü was gunned down at
the aforementioned bus stop. She died on the spot.
Shortly afterwards, three of her brothers -- who
reportedly had long been threatening her -- were
arrested. Investigators suspect it was a so-called
"honor killing," given the fact that Sürücü's
ultra-conservative Turkish-Kurdish family strongly
disapproved of her modern and "un-Islamic" life.
Sürücü grew up in Berlin and was married off at 16 to
a cousin in Istanbul. After a few years, she returned
to the German capital with her young son, moved into a
home for single mothers, completed school and began to
train as an electrician. She stopped wearing a
headscarf and was said to be outgoing and vivacious.
"She lived like a German"
Though not the first of its kind, the brazen shooting
has sent shockwaves through Berlin, home to a large
foreign community and which for years has fretted over
steady ghetto-building in districts dominated by
Turkish and Arab immigrants. While the incident has
reopened debate on the integration of immigrants and
the compatibility of Islamic values with Western ones,
it’s the reaction of a small group of Turkish students
to the murder that has rattled the German capital.
Days after Hatin Sürücü was killed, some male students
of Turkish origin at a high school near the scene of
the crime reportedly downplayed the act. During a
class discussion on the murder, one said, "She (Hatin
Sürücü) only had herself to blame," while another
remarked "She deserved what she got --the whore lived
like a German." The school's director promptly dashed
off a letter to parents and students, castigating the
students and warning that the school didn’t tolerate
incitement against freedom.
"Her lifestyle didn't fit"
The comments have sparked outrage and left many asking
if it was just a one-off or whether such thinking is
in fact not entirely uncommon among sections of the
Muslim community in the city.
According to some, it isn't. "There isn't a single
school with a high foreign population where teachers
haven't faced this kind of thing, where individual
students sometimes regard murder as a just sentence,"
said Heinz Wagner, head of school and education policy
at the VBE teachers trade union and a school director
himself. Referring to the controversial remarks on
Sürücü's murder, he said, "The very fact that they
decided to provoke with something like that tells you
that they're getting their ideas from somewhere."
At Berlin's Turkish-dominated neighborhood near
Kottbusser Tor in the Kreuzberg district, 17-year-old
Erkan, a high school student of Turkish origin, was
divided about the issue. "I'm not saying you should
murder, but Hatin's lifestyle just didn't fit the way
traditional Muslims live," he said.
No regret, but pride
Experts insist that the problem is in no way a purely
"Islamic phenomenon" and that the remarks of a few
shouldn't be allowed to taint an entire community.
But, statistics in Berlin show that murders ostensibly
meant to uphold the honor of the family are high among
Muslims.
At the juvenile prison in the Berlin suburb
Plötzensee, six of the current 529 inmates are serving
time of six years and more for manslaughter in
so-called "honor crimes." All come from the Muslim
world. Aged between 18 and 22, one of them, an Afghan
national, was 16 when he helped relatives kill a
widowed aunt who had refused to marry her
brother-in-law.
Prison director Marius Fiedler said most of the
murders are often carefully plotted in the family with
the support of all, including women. "Usually the
patriarch selects the youngest son to carry out the
crime because he knows that judges in Germany don't
usually give the maximum sentence of 10 years to a
minor for manslaughter," he said.
Fiedler admitted that getting the inmates, who undergo
psychological therapy, to reform or change their
attitudes is difficult. "Many come from rural areas in
Turkey or Lebanon and just don't know the concept of
individualism," he said. "They don't feel any regret
for what they did though some even kill their favorite
sister. Instead, they're honored and feel like martyrs
for having been chosen to carry out the crime."
Ethics class the answer?
The realization that murder and archaic concepts of
honor might actually find favor with some teenagers in
the city, have caused alarm among Berlin's politicians
and some Muslim organizations.
"It might be a minority, but even one person
applauding the murder of Hatin Sürücü is absolutely
unacceptable," said Kenan Kolat, head of the Turkish
Association in Berlin and Brandenburg.
His organization has initiated a discussion with
teachers, politicians, parents and imams and is
planning to work with Turkish newspapers and TV
stations in Berlin to kick-start a debate on
democratic values among the Turkish community.
"We have to begin speaking about the role of women,
about honor concepts, dignity, mutual respect and
democratic values," Kolat said. In addition to city
politicians' plans to introduce a mandatory ethics
course in schools across Berlin, Kolat is pushing for
an Islamic studies course. "The mainstream classroom
has to be the place where one can get information
about Islam, not in 'Islamic institutes' who have the
theological upper hand in the city," he said.
Some, however, are skeptical of such flash-in-the-pan
plans. "Every time there's a controversial incident,
politicians routinely come up with 'ethics class' as a
panacea," said school director Wagner. "But the school
can't be the only place for learning democratic
values. You have to begin with the family."
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