Hudood Ordinances

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Report on the hadd penalties on Geo TV

As Hudood Ordinances , English for Hudood ordinances , four ordinances for the Islamization of criminal law in Pakistan are summarized , which the military dictator Zia ul-Haq issued in 1979. The term Hudood is the Anglicized form of the Arabic plural word Hudūd ( Arabic حدود, DMG ḥudūd ), which describes a group of crimes under Islamic law that are subject to special penalties (see Hadd penalty ). This includes offenses such as theft and robbery , fornication ( adultery , rape ), false accusations of fornication and the consumption of alcohol or narcotics. In 2006, at the initiative of then President Musharraf, a law was passed to limit the Hudood regulations. These regulations exist alongside the "secular" laws. Courts of Session are responsible instead of the magistrates ; Appeals go to the Federal Sharia Court and further to the Sharia Arbitration Bank of the Supreme Court.

One of the main criticisms of the regulations was and is that they mix the offenses of adultery ( zina ) and rape ( zina bil-japr ). For example, women who report a man for rape are often charged with adultery themselves if they cannot prove the rape. The Hudood regulations are clearly more misogynistic than the "normal" Sharia law. According to Hudood law, for example, a woman does not need two witnesses as usual to refute a man's testimony in court , but the testimony of four men, who also have to be Muslims .

Hudood judgments have been overturned by both secular and sharia courts and have rarely been carried out in the past. Yet 80% of the roughly 6,000 women in Pakistani prisons are held there as a result of Hudood convictions.

The Hudood Ordinances are particularly disadvantageous for the non-Muslim minorities of Pakistan. Organizations such as the All Pakistan Minorities Alliance or the CLF are working on proposals for more tolerant laws and women's rights and better legal protection for prisoners and victims of violence.

In 2006, on the initiative of President Pervez Musharraf, a law was passed to restrict the Hudood Regulations and improve women's rights in court. Among other things, it was a matter of removing rape from the Hadood regulations and re-introducing it into the criminal code. A woman would have a better standing in a Sharia court than in a Hadood court. It also enjoys greater legal protection in general criminal law; there rape can be punished on the basis of evidence and with fewer witnesses.

Human rights organizations estimate that a woman is raped every three minutes in Pakistan. That would be 480 women a day, 175,200 a year, with a population of 166 million (comparison D: 7,500 advertisements per year with 82 million inhabitants).

literature

  • Rubya Mehdi: The Islamization of the Law in Pakistan . Richmond, Surrey 1994.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. entered into force on 12th Rabi-ul-Awwat 1399 (10 February 1979)
  2. ^ Offences against Property (Enforcement of Hudood) Ordinance, 1979 (Ordinance No. VI of 1979)
  3. ^ Offence of Zina (Enforcement of Hudood) Ordinance, 1979 (Ordinance No. VII of 1979) → current version
  4. Offense of qazf (Enforcement of Hadd) Ordinance, 1979 (Ordinance No. VIII of 1979) → current version
  5. ^ Prohibition (Enforcement of Hadd) Order, 1979 (President's Order No. 4 of 1979)
  6. Protection of Women (Criminal Laws Amendment) Act, 2006 (Act No. VI of 2006)
  7. Shariat Appellate Bench ( Constitution of Pakistan, Article 203F para. 3 )
  8. ^ Offence of Zina (Enforcement of Hudood) Ordinance , section 8
  9. ^ Pakistan Penal Code , section 375