Baghdad: Iraq was rocked by a new horrific crime after a 22-year-old Iraqi YouTuber and activist, Tiba Al-Ali, died by suffocation at the hands of her father, due to family disputes, local media reported.
The interior ministry spokesman Saad Maan in a series of tweets on Friday said that Tiba Al-Ali was killed by her father on January 31 in Diwaniya Governorate, southern Iraq.
“The police tried to mediate between Ali – who was residing in Turkey and was visiting Iraq – and her relatives to “resolve the family dispute once and for all,” Maan tweeted.
After the police’s initial meeting with the family, Maan said, “We were surprised the next day…by the news that she had been murdered by her father, as he admitted in his initial confessions.”
Ali was a YouTuber who posted videos about her daily life in Turkey. Her videos also regularly featured her fiance.
As per media reports, Tiba Al-Ali travelled to Turkey with her family in 2017, but upon their return she refused to join them, choosing instead to remain in Turkey where she has lived ever since.
Ali’s father was reportedly not happy with her decision to live alone in Turkey.
Clips of dialogue between the victim and her father, surfaced on social media, where he is heard saying that he was not satisfied with her remaining to live in Turkey, while the victim responded by accusing her brother of “sexually harassing” her.
The hashtag Tiba Ali has also spread widely on social media and in Iraqi circles.
The crime sparked outrage in Iraq, prompting activists to call for demonstrations, Sunday morning, in front of a court in Baghdad to demand justice.
Amnesty International condemned the incident saying “The Iraqi penal code still treats leniently so-called ‘honour crimes’ comprising violent acts such as assault and even murder”.
“Until the Iraqi authorities adopt robust legislation to protect women and girls… we will inevitably continue to witness horrific murders,” said Amnesty’s deputy director for the Middle East and North Africa, Aya Majzoub.
The Tiba Al-Ali incident brought back to the minds of Iraqis what happened to another Iraqi, Malak al-Zubaidi, in 2020, who was forced by marital violence to set herself on fire.
In the same year, in the border province of Wasit with Iran, a 58-year-old doctor killed his wife, because she refused to allow him to sell land in her name to benefit from the money, according to a report from Agence France-Presse (AFP).
The United Nations says that 46 percent of married women have been victims of domestic violence, a third of whom have experienced physical and sexual violence.
According to the International Organization for Migration, 85 percent of Iraqi men say they would prevent any woman in their family from filing a complaint.
As for the women, 75 percent of them say they will not speak to the police for fear of further violence, or that they will be seen and rejected afterwards.
