SPIEGELONLINE INTERNATIONAL: The German charity Hatun and Can, set up in memory of "honor killing" victim Hatun Sürücü, helps Turkish women who are in danger of becoming victims of violence. Two women who fled forced marriages tell their stories.
Aylin (not her real name) had just turned 15 when her parents decided she should get married. She had finished her secondary school education and was studying nursing at a vocational school. Of course, she was still living with her parents, in a small town in the German state of Hesse.
A potential husband was soon found, M. from Frankfurt. He had studied business administration and was 13 years older than Aylin. “My parents met him at a relative’s wedding,” she recalls.
Aylin’s parents, who were both born in Turkey in 1954 but grew up in Germany, never bothered to ask if their daughter agreed with their choice. “I was engaged,” she says. “Or rather, I was sold.”
The fiancé’s parents paid Aylin’s parents €17,000 ($26,750) in cash and additionally gave them jewelry worth around €20,000. “Then we all went shopping in Turkey -- his mother, my mother, him and me.” She needed a wedding dress, he[,] a dark suit.
Four hundred guests came to the engagement celebration at Aylin’s parents’ house. Shortly beforehand, Aylin and her fiancé had come into closer contact for the first time. “He hit me in the face when I told him I didn’t like him,” she says. Nevertheless, the engagement proceeded as planned. “Then life in hell began.” German Charity Helps Turkish Women Escape Forced Marriages >>> By Henryk M. Broder | April 24, 2008
The Dawning of a New Dark Age (Paperback - UK)
The Dawning of a New Dark Age (Hardback - UK)
