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High profile cases during the last few years have led to increased awareness about honour crimes and to the launching of help offers by authorities and non-profit organisations.

In January 2005, the Home Office and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office founded the Forced Marriage Unit to bring together their domestic and overseas activities.

“A few high profile cases of forced marriage and honour crime have raised awareness in Britain,” Lisa Bandari, head of the Forced Marriage Unit said, “the public interest is growing.”

Diana Nammi, head of the International Campaign against Honour Killing, confirmed that during the last few years the situation has changed significantly.

“I regard the case of Heshu Yonez, a victim of honour killing in 2002, as a watershed,” she said, “before that honour killing was barely known by the authorities and not considered as a crime in many communities.”
Ms Nammi added: “I remember talking to a detective who was working on Heshu’s case.

"He said even if she had tried to seek police help, no officer would have believed that a father would kill his daughter because she has a boyfriend.”

 

Following the death of Rukhsana Naz in 1999, the Home Office set up consultation groups in connection with the police.

Metropolitan Police had formed a group to do research around honour crimes, spokesperson Helen Kennedy confirmed.

"Since 2000 Metropolitan police have been working on the issue on honour based crime," Yasmin Rehman, Director of Partnership and Diversity in the Violence and Crime Department of Metropolitan Police, said.

"We have developed police responses to honour crime such as forced marriage, genital mutilation and honour killing.

"Furthermore we developed guidelines for education and social services and tried to regard the issue in an international context."

Regular conferences on honour based crime and training for officers were organised to improve police responses, Ms Rehman added.

She warned of damaging community relations by immediately labelling every incident as honour crime.

"It is difficult to recognise honour based crime. Where is the difference between honour and love crime?", she said.

Although the focus was on ethnic minorities, honour had to be considered an issue in all communities, Ms Rehman added.