Five men charged over gang rape acquitted in Pakistan

[News_Editor]

Five men charged over gang rape acquitted in Pakistan

2011-04-21 23:35:21 GMT+7 (ICT)

ISLAMABAD, PAKISTAN (BNO NEWS) -- Pakistan's Supreme Court on Thursday acquitted five men accused of participating in a 2002 gang rape in southern Muzafargarh district, Geo Television reported.

The Court upheld the verdict of the Lahore High Court (LHC) of exonerating the five men and sentencing another one, Abdul Khaliq, to life in prison. The Supreme Court suspended the initial 2005 verdict of LHC.

However, the three-member bench of the apex court maintained the LHC verdict in the case of the gang rape against Mukhtaran Mai, a 30-year-old resident of Meerwala village.

On June 22, 2002, Mai was gang raped in her village under orders of an influential local Mastoi tribe council. The victim said on Thursday that she will consult with her attorney the possibility of filing an appeal.

Initially, fourteen individuals were arrested and accused for their involvement in the gang rape. Eight of them were acquitted and the remaining six were sentenced to death penalty.

Afterwards, the Lahore High Court acquitted five of them and changed the death penalty to a sentence of life in prison. Mai filed petitions in the apex court against Khaliq and the other five people.

-- © BNO News All rights reserved 2011-04-21

[Steely Dan]

More outrageous misogynistic behaviour from a bunch of savages. Even AlJazeera has to come down against this one.

http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2011/04/201142110545244100.html

Human Rights Watch, a New York-based rights group, expressed dismay at the court's decision, saying that the attack on Mai had taken place "in full public view and the perpetrators were publically identified".

I await the condemnation of this disgusting verdict from our left wing friends.

Edited April 22, 2011 by Steely Dan

[metisdead]

One off topic post has been removed. Discussion of "Five men charged over gang rape acquitted in Pakistan" would be on topic to this thread while discussion of crimes committed by US soldiers in Iraq would we another topic altogether.

[Steely Dan]

I'm not sure where I stand on the death penalty, but it is clear that failing that those convicted should be locked up for a very long time indeed, which is what happened. In the Pakistani rape case the accused were in the main aquitted in spite of clear evidence to their identification.

Justice should be universal and apply equally regardless of sex, race, gender preference etc. This is patently not so in Pakistan.

P.S I think we were warned not to use wiki links as they can be edited by anyone, though I will take your posted link as accurate for the purposes of this reply.

Edited April 22, 2011 by cdnvic
removed deleted quotes

[cdnvic]

I wouldn't say warned against as much as advised to to put too much faith into them. The warning part of that conversation was aimed at people just pasting links back and forth and not doing any discussing.

The effective way to use Wikis is to use them as a guide and look at the citations at the bottom which link to more verifiable information. Use those as your source and you come away with a stronger argument.

[geriatrickid]

Tough slog for women's rights advocates. I hope people keep this in mind when women's issues in some countries are raised. As men, we sometimes do not appreciate the life these people endure.