A/HRC/20/16 male killer, with 60 per cent of the victims being wives, common-law wives, ex-wives, or girlfriends of the offenders.43 In 2008 firearms were the most common weapon used by men to murder women, with nearly two thirds of the women having been murdered by male intimate partners. Women also suffer ―hostile gun displays‖ as a form of intimate partner violence, by which abusive partners threaten to use guns against their victims. 44 2. Killings of women due to accusations of sorcery/witchcraft 36. The killing of women accused of sorcery/witchcraft has been reported as a significant phenomenon in countries in Africa, Asia and the Pacific Islands. 45 The pattern of violations includes violent murders, physical mutilation, displacement, kidnapping and disappearances of girls and women. 46 In many countries where women are accused of sorcery/witchcraft, they are also subjected to exorcism ceremonies involving public beating and abuse by shamans or village elders.47 37. Although in the majority of the cases younger women are at higher risk of sorcery/witchcraft violence, a study has found that in some parts of Africa, older women are more vulnerable to sorcery-related femicide due to their economic dependence on others, or the property rights that they hold—and which younger members of the family want to inherit.48 Also, if women are perceived as dangerous and a threat to men, their labelling as witches, and consequently their destruction, is then seen as justified.49 38. A study in Zimbabwe found that of the 42 cases of femicide involving women older than 50, most of the women had been accused of witchcraft by male relatives prior to the killing.50 A study conducted in Ghana found that many poor, often elderly, women were accused of witchcraft and subsequently murdered by male relatives, or subjected to a range of physical, sexual and economic abuses. 51 39. Women accused of witchcraft in Ghana are often violently driven from their communities and forced to take refuge in ―witch camps‖. Many widows are subjected to property-related violence, including violent evictions and loss of inheritance; and subjected to sexual abuse and harassment by relatives.52 In India, based on accusations of being a dayan (witch) or practising banamathi (witchcraft), physical violence is sometimes employed against Dalit women as a mechanism to take possession of their family lands 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 10 Violence Policy Center, When Men Murder Women: An Analysis of 2008 Homicide Data. Washington, DC, 2010, p. 10. Available at http://www.vpc.org/studies/wmmw2010.pdf Ibid. p. 1. See, Chapter on victim groups in the extrajudicial executions context of the Handbook compiling observations and recommendations of the Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions (hereinafter ―Handbook on Victim Groups‖), Chapter 8, Victim Groups, at pp. 47-50. Indai Sajor, ―Gender-motivated Killings of Women Accused of Sorcery & Witchcraft a Form of Femicide: Papua New Guinea Case‖, paper prepared for Expert Group Meeting, October 12 th, 2011. pp. 9-10. Handbook on Victim Groups (Supra Note 45) p. 49 Galloway, S. (1995) ―Femicide project‖. Report by country. Zimbabwe. Women in Law and Development in Africa (WiLDAF). Watts, C., Osam, S. and E. Win (2001) ―Femicide in Southern Africa‖, edited extracts from ―The private is public: A study of violence against women in Southern Africa‖. Harare, Zimbabwe, Women in Law and Development in Africa, 1995. In Harmes, R. and D. Russell (eds.) (2001) ―Femicide in Global Perspective”, New York: Teachers College Press. Supra note 48. See, Adinkrah, M., ―Witchcraft accusation and female homicide victimization in contemporary Ghana‖, Violence against women, vol. 10, No. 4 (2004), pp. 325-356, in In-depth study on all forms of violence against women, Report of the U.N. Secretary-General at para. 125. A/HRC/7/6/Add.3, report of the Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences, Addendum, Mission to Ghana, 21 February 2008.