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An Afghan prisoner murdered his wife when she went to visit him, allegedly because she had been unfaithful after he was jailed for killing her relatives, police said.

Din Mohammad was sentenced to 20 years in prison two years ago for killing his mother-in-law, and his wife’s brother and sister in the northern province of Samangan.

Mohammad’s wife, whose name has not been disclosed, visited him in jail in the provincial capital Aybak on Monday and was found dead in a small private room used for inmates to see their wives, police said.

Mohammad confessed to her murder, Samangan police chief Ikram Nikzad told AFP.

“Mohammad was told by his mother that his wife had affairs,” he said, citing a police investigation.

“When she came to visit him in jail he strangled her with her veil and killed her. They were meeting in a private prison room,” he said.

Mohammad’s mother has been detained for questioning, Nikzad added.

According to a UN report last month, Afghanistan has made progress in protecting women against violence, but many still suffer horrific abuse 11 years after a US-led invasion brought down the Taliban regime.

Afghan women still endure killings by relatives in the name of family honour, forced marriages and domestic abuses.

A father in northwestern India remained unrepentant Tuesday after beheading his daughter with a ceremonial sword in a rage over her relationships with men, police said.

The father surrendered at a police station, carrying the head in one hand and the bloodied sword in the other, police said.

Residents of Dungarji village expressed shock as they performed the last rites for the 20-year-old woman.

Police said the father, marble miner Oghad Singh, accused his daughter of bringing dishonor to the family and making it hard to find husbands for her two unmarried sisters.

Chechnya’s government is openly approving of families that kill female relatives who violate their sense of honor, as this Russian republic embraces a fundamentalist interpretation of Islam after decades of religious suppression under Soviet rule.

In the past five years, the bodies of dozens of young Chechen women have been found dumped in woods, abandoned in alleys and left along roads in the capital, Grozny, and neighboring villages.

Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov publicly announced that the dead women had “loose morals” and were rightfully shot by male relatives. He went on to describe women as the property of their husbands, and said their main role is to bear children.

“If a woman runs around and if a man runs around with her, both of them should be killed,” said Mr. Kadyrov, who often has stated his goal of making Chechnya “more Islamic than the Islamists.”

In today’s Chechnya, alcohol is all but banned, Islamic dress codes are enforced and polygamous marriages are supported by the government.

At least 943 Pakistani women and girls were murdered last year for allegedly defaming their family’s honor, the country’s leading human rights group said Thursday.

The statistics highlight the growing scale of violence suffered by many women in conservative Muslim Pakistan, where they are frequently treated as second-class citizens and there is no law against domestic violence.

Despite progress on better protecting women’s rights, activists say the government needs to do more to prosecute murderers in cases largely dismissed by police as private, family affairs.

“At least 943 women were killed in the name of honor, of which 93 were minors,” wrote the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan in its annual report.

Seven Christian and two Hindu women were among the victims, it said.

The Commission reported 791 “honor killings” in 2010.

Around 595 of the women killed in 2011 were accused of having “illicit relations” and 219 of marrying without permission.

Kot Chuttha police have arrested a man who has admitted to killing his wife, Samina, her sister (his brother’s wife) and their mother in collusion with his brother in a Dera Ghazi Khan village.

Talking to The Express Tribune at the police station, Ismaeel said he did not believe he had committed a crime. “My wife and her sister (his brother’s wife) had loose morals. They deserved death. I can’t let my wife talk to other men,” he said. He said he had caught Samina (his wife) talking to a man over cell phone.

The suspect said he and his brother, Imran, had shot and killed Samina and Zarmina, their wives, and their mother, Kulsoom, on Friday night. “Their mother was to blame for it. She had failed to raise her daughters in accordance with our traditions. I had warned her (mother-in-law) several times to control her daughters,” he said.

According to the FIR registered on a complaint filed by the father of the deceased sisters, Mukhtar, the suspects had came to his house on Friday night to ask their wives to return home with them.

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But remember, this is a ‘cultural issue’ and we shouldn’t be concerned with it. Besides, everyone knows honor killings don’t really happen. Islamic countries treat their women like gold.

Allah Bachaya has surrendered himself to Rohilanwali police after killing his sister in the name of honour but he is confident that he will be released in a matter of days.

Bachaya gave his arrest on Saturday after killing Alina in an axe attack for alleged loose morals.

He told The Express Tribune that he was certain his brother-in-law would withdraw the case as it was a matter of family’s honour. “I have killed her because she brought disgrace to the family’s name,” Bachaya said.

“She had become a nuisance. I feel no remorse over my actions. I am backed by the family. They were in favour of my decision to kill her,” he said.

Bachaya said Alina* had eloped more than once with [different] men from the neighbourhood. On Saturday, he said, she had returned home after spending three days with a man.

Alina, 25, was married to Muhammad Akhtar. The couple had three children

At least 675 Pakistani women and girls were murdered during the first nine months of the year for allegedly defaming their family’s honour, a leading human rights group said today.

The statistics highlight the scale of violence suffered by many women in conservative Muslim Pakistan, where they are frequently treated as second-class citizens and there is no law against domestic violence.

Despite some progress on better protecting women’s rights, activists say the government needs to do far more to prosecute murderers in cases largely dismissed by police as private, family affairs.

“A total of 675 women and girls were killed in the name of honour across Pakistan from January to September,” a senior official in the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan said.

They included at least 71 victims under the age of 18.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he is unauthorised to speak to the media, said figures were still being compiled for the period covering October to December, and that a full report would be released in February.

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But, remember, as our leftist friends repeatedly point out, this is a cultural thing so we shouldn’t be concerned about it.

One shudders to think what would happen if his or her daughter suffered the unspeakable crime of rape. For most parents, thoughts of bringing the perpetrator to justice, combined with determining how best to care for their wounded daughter and nurse her back to mental and physical health would top priorities. For rape victims in many Islamic countries, however, it is quite the opposite, with the female victim often becoming the pariah, and later, a potential target for an honor killing.

For 17-year-old Pakistani girl Kainat Soomro, who was allegedly gang raped four years ago, that fortunately was not the case. Her family resisted widespread pressure to kill their daughter for supposedly disgracing them by falling victim to the heinous crime.

Soomro has become a kind of local celebrity in her struggle for justice in the Pakistani courts while she and the entire family is allegedly under a near constant threat of death.

Her father sat next to her as she recounted the 2007 incident. Atlantic Wire reports:

“I was walking home from my school and I went to the store to buy a toy for my niece,” she said, staring at the floor of the office. “While I was looking at things a guy pressed a handkerchief on my nose. I fainted and was kidnapped. Then four men gang raped me.”

As she shared details of her days in captivity and multiple rapes, she kept repeating, “I want justice, I will not stop until I get justice.” After three days, she was finally able to escape she said. As she spoke, her father gently tapped her head. He said he tried to get Kainat’s alleged rapists arrested, but instead he was rebuffed by the police.

According to the Kainat family’s account, the tribal elders declared her kari, (which literally means black female), for losing her virginity outside marriage.

In Pakistan, as is the case in most Islamic countries, women who lose their virginity before marriage, or even those who are raped, are “shamed” and therefore run the risk of falling victim to an honor killing — often at the hands of their own family members.

“These are matters of honor and the leaders call a jirga and they declare that the woman or the couple should be killed,” said Abdul Hai, a veteran field officer for the Human Rights Commission in Pakistan. These acts of violence are most commonly labeled as “honor killings.”

According to AW, the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan released a 2009 report revealing that roughly 46 percent of all female murders in Pakistan were committed in the name of “honor.“ The actual incidences of ”honor killings” in Pakistan are likely much higher, however, as many cases go unreported.

Fortunately, Kainat said that despite the pressures, her family refused to murder her:

“It is the tradition, but if the family doesn’t permit it, then it won’t happen. My father, my brother, my mom didn’t allow it,” she said.

And that defiance has left the family fearing for their lives. The family’s new home in Karachi has been attacked a number of times.

A man gunned down six of his daughters on suspicion that two of them were in relationships with boys in the neighbourhood.

On Tuesday morning, Arif Mubashir called his teenage daughters to his room and shot them while the rest of the family, including their mother, watched. His wife Musarrat called the police after the incident.

Mubashir shot the girls after their brother said two of them were in a relationship. He told police officials that he had killed his daughters because they were both “without honour”. The man said his daughters Sameena, 14, and Razia, 16, were in a relationship with college boys from the neighbourhood and the sisters had helped each other. “I should have been told immediately but the girls sided with each other. They were both corrupt,” Mubashir told Tandlianwala Police Inspector Javed Sial.

Police officials have taken Mubashir into custody and filed a case against him. “He does not regret what he did. He boasted that he would do it all over again if he had to,” Sial told reporters.

Pakistan has repeatedly been termed as one of the least women-friendly countries. In June, the Thompson Reuters Foundation ranked Pakistan as the world’s third most dangerous country for women.