Social and Legal Actions to Combat Honor Related Abuses Project

Project name: Social and Legal Actions to Combat Honor Related Abuses

Leading partner: Center for Sustainable Communities Development

Partners: KUN Center for Equality and Diversity - https://www.kun.no/english.html

Women’s Advocates Association - https://www.womenlawyers.bg/

 Budget: 161 687,49 euro

Duration: 14 months  (September 2019 – October 2020)

"The girl's family refused to look for her and take care of a lawyer because they believed that the honor of the family was tarnished."

Stories resembling a horror movie. This is how some cases of honor related crimes in Bulgaria sound. Inspector Desislava Viktorova from the National Police, the Crimes Against Personality department, tells us how the police is proceeding when it comes to such a sensitive type of abuse.

*This article reflects a personal opinion of the expert and the team of the project does not commit to it.

„Child Bride“[1] from … Bulgaria

"I paid her for a maiden, and you gave her to me dishonored."

"There was a case in Drenovets, a woman sold her 8-year-old daughter in Sofia. When the boy's parents came to pick her up, she started crying for the swing because she was swinging in the yard.

Change in the activity schedule of "Social and legal action to combat honor related abuse" (HRA Project)

Due to the declared emergency situation and the restrictions imposed, the project schedule has to be changed. However, the work on it continues to be active.

The outreach activities under the current sociological survey will start again as soon as the restrictive measures have ceased.

Deana Dimova: “Roma women do not feel that violence against them and their children is something wrong”

This is the opinion of manager and founder of Centre Dinamika Association – Deana Dimova. She has a master's degree in psychology and a postgraduate qualification in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and Social Management. She has been working in the social field for over 15 years - psychodiagnosis, training, psychosocial support and counseling for victims of domestic and gender-based violence. Here's what she told us according to her personal practice in the anti-violence center which she leads.

Does the Bulgarian legislation provide protection of refugees, victims of honor related violence?

Diana Radoslavova - Co - founder, Manager, and chief lawyer of Center for Legal Aid “Voice in Bulgaria”. (CLA)

Since 2009 CLA works on protection of the rights of migrants, refugees and asylum seekers in Bulgaria by providing legal assistance and advocacy. They have years of experience working in closed immigration centers and advocacy of alternatives to detention. They are also working on a project on very vulnerable migrant women over the past 2 years.

Experts from 6 countries discussed social and legal actions to combat honor related abuses

Specialists from Bulgaria, Romania, Norway, UK, Italy and Germany met on February 18 during the online final conference of "Social and Legal Action to Combat Honor Related Abuses" project to talk about honor related issues.

Experts from all over Bulgaria speak on the issues in the name of honor

Difficult detection and provability, lack of maturity, religious and traditional peculiarities, lack of serious punishments - these are some of the problems related to the prevention, establishment and punishment of honor related abuses in Bulgaria.

Good practices from Norway

Honor related crimes are far from being only a problem of our society. They are fact not only in countries in Asia and Middle East but in different parts of Europe.

Honor Related Abuses in social and legal aspect is the new topic in the project portfolio of Center for Sustainable Communities Development

The legislation lacks a definition of abuse or violence in the name of honor and a data collection system. This is to review the project in the next two years. Leading partner in the project is Center for Sustainable Communities Development. The other two partners are KUN Center for Equality and Diversity, Norway and Women  Lawyers Association, Bulgaria.

Honour related abuses - a report with the results of a survey conducted among experts

In April, Association Korektivi prepared an analytical report with the results of a survey conducted among experts through in-depth interviews.

The main questions that interested the researchers were what the experts meant by honour related abuses; what are the risk factors for the spread of honour related abuses, what is the assessment of experts on the level of spread of the phenomenon in the country, as well as to describe the socio-demographic profile of risk groups, to examine the opinion of experts on interaction, awareness and readiness to work on such cases and finally to summarize the recommendations received.

Lebanon- Underage Marriages Increase during the Pandemic

Child protection campaigners say closed schools and rising poverty, along with the lack of a legal minimum age, are pushing more girls under 18 into marriage.

Press conference on honor-related abuses in Bulgaria

Honor-related crimes are almost unknown in our country. However, it turns out that for some citizens of Bulgaria this is part of their everyday life. This was made clear at a press conference on "Social and legal action to combat honor related abuse" project on February 4.

Public discussions on changes in the law for honor related crimes

Over the past two months, more than 100 people from Sofia and several smaller cities in the country have held public consultations on "Honor related crimes".

Recommendations for political and legislative changes regarding honour related abuses were the main topic of the recent meeting for exchange of good practices with project partners

The two-day workshop on the project "Social and Legal Action to Combat Honour Related Abuses" took place in Sofia, with KUN partners joining online.

Tender procedure for awarding contract for a national sociological survey

You can download the selection protocol from here (Download as PDF)

The most “problematic” form of honour-related violence in Bulgaria are early forced marriages

This shows anationally representative study of the population on the basis of face-to-face interviews and in-depth interviews with experts, conducted by Association “Korektivi” under the „Social and legal action to combat honour related abuse“ project. Here are the details:

The story of thousands of Romeo and Juliet that comes to life every day

Zakia and Ali live in neighboring houses in a small town in Afghanistan. Both of them do not have real access to romantic love to form an idea of it on a Western model. In their country, young people are forbidden to watch romantic movies or TV series, listen to such plays on the radio or in the form of musical songs. However, like many other young people in Afghanistan, they fall in love and decide they want to be together.