Homicide-Suicide in Russia and Pakistan: Observations From Press Media Reports

This study compares the features of homicide-suicide in Russia and Pakistan. To understand this, we conducted a content analysis of news reports about homicide-suicide published in Pakistani and Russian newspapers between March 2020 and May 2023. We identified 35 and 104 homicide-suicide cases in Pakistani and Russian media, respectively. Men were three to five times more likely to commit homicide-suicides than women (3.16: 1 in Russia; 4.83: 1 in Pakistan). Accounting for over 65.73% of all homicide-suicides, spousal homicide-suicides and filicide-suicide were the most common homicide-suicides in both regions. Filicide-suicides were more often done by Russian women and extra-family homicide-suicides by Pakistani women. Reasons for homicide-suicides in Pakistani women were divorce or separation and in Russian women - mental disorders. With the difference of homicide in the victims, Pakistani victims were aged 15-30 years, while Russian were 31-45 years and 46 years and older. There were more similarities in homicide-suicides than differences.