Mick Hartley

This is a strange case:

A baby at risk of becoming the victim of an "honour killing" because she was born as the result of her unmarried Muslim mother's secret affair must be adopted to keep her safe, the Court of Appeal ruled on Wednesday.

Three senior judges rejected a bid by the one-year-old girl's natural father to have her live with him and his wife.

The child's natural mother is in favour of adoption so that her own family will not find out about the birth.

Lord Justice Munby, Lady Justice Black and Lord Justice Kitchin said in a joint judgment the case involved "exceptionally difficult adoption proceedings," the Press Association reported.

The judges imposed unusually wide reporting restrictions banning the publication of all names and locations linked to the case because of the continuing dangers faced by mother and child…

The judge ordered that "baby Q" should be adopted by a couple, also Muslim, from the same country as the mother, but from a different community.

She found there would be "a very significant risk of two and two being put together" if the child went to the father because Q was quite obviously not the child of his wife, who had a child of her own.

If the child's maternal grandfather found out about the affair "it would be a matter of intense almost unimaginable shame to him and his family," said the judge.

The appeal court said on Wednesday: "It was plainly the judge's view that this might provoke action to preserve the family's honour."…

Both the unmarried mother and her lover were from abroad and moved to the UK in the last 10 years. Although both Muslim, there was a "profound cultural difference" between them.

When M realised she might be pregnant she ran away from home. She was "terrified" over how her family would react.

As soon as Q was born, she gave her daughter up for adoption because she "genuinely feared for Q's safety should (her father) become aware of, or forced to acknowledge, her existence."

Q's grandmother had told the police that, if her husband found out about the child, "he would consider himself honour-bound to kill the child, the mother, the grandmother herself and the grandmother's other children."…

The adopting couple were Muslims who had taken advice from their imam that they could adopt Q.

While appreciating that this may well be the best solution in very difficult circumstances, one could perhaps wish for a little more condemnation of the attitudes that led to this farce, and a little less acceptance of it all as somehow the way things are. And why is it so essential that the baby be adopted by a Muslim couple? – who had first to obtain permission from their imam?

Meanwhile:

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 Tuesday.

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….

The Commission reported 791 honour killings in 2010 and there was no discernible decrease this year, the official added.

Around 450 of the women killed from January to September were accused of having "illicit relations" and 129 of marrying without permission.

Some victims were raped or gangraped before being killed… At least 19 were killed by their sons, 49 by their fathers and 169 by their husbands.