On Saturday, August 22, 2026, Atousa Jafari, a 27 year old woman from Sanandaj and an employee of that city’s postal department, was attacked with a bladed weapon from behind as she left her workplace and got into her car. She suffered severe blood loss from multiple stab wounds, including one to the heart, and died.
Preliminary reports identify Atousa Jafari’s former husband as the principal suspect in this killing; he is reported to have fled following the attack. Atousa had separated from him several years earlier and had been living with her mother, but according to available information, she continued to face threats and ongoing harassment even after the separation. No information has yet been made public regarding the suspect’s arrest, any complaints Atousa may have filed over the threats, or measures taken by responsible institutions to protect her.
This killing occurred only two days after the femicide of Latifeh Mohammadzadeh, a 49 year old woman from Saqqez, a case Hana had previously reported on and in which there was likewise a history of violence and threats following separation. Atousa Jafari is the second woman to have been murdered in Kurdistan within three days, in each case following a history of threats and violence.
These two killings cannot be reduced to individual violence or “family disputes.” The absence of an effective legal system for the prompt assessment of risk, the issuance of protective orders, access to safe housing, and preventive intervention by law enforcement and judicial institutions leaves women defenseless even after they have left violent relationships. This protective vacuum leaves a woman’s individuality, and her right to end a relationship and possess an independent identity, effectively without support, and clears the ground for a misogynistic norm that continues to treat a woman, even after separation, as subject to a man’s will and authority, and answers her independence with control, threats, and revenge.