Pakistani wife in disputed marriage gunned down in court by her brother

 A new low for Pakistan:(

So-called honour killings by families who believe their daughters have disgraced them are increasingly common in Pakistan. But the gunning down last week of a woman by her brother, a lawyer, in front of dozens of witnesses in a packed courtroom in the bustling city of Hyderabad marks an alarming new low.

The family of 22 year-old Raheela Sehto had already made their fury at her marriage to Zulfiqar Sehto – a love match struck without their permission – abundantly clear. They reacted by filing a claim with local police that their daughter had been kidnapped by her 30-year-old husband, a life-long neighbour who had wooed Raheela over the years, although largely through clandestine mobile phone conversations.

Her uncle had tried to throttle her with a scarf at an earlier appearance at the high court in Hyderabad in July. The couple had petitioned the court for its protection and to try and have the kidnapping charges thrown out.

But Sehto, a university graduate working for the local electricity company, said they felt they had no reason to fear for their lives in court, even when in the earlier part of the morning he was sitting almost directly in front of his wife's eventual killer, Javed Iqbal Shaikh, her brother.

Shortly after the two judges had returned to their seats after a break, Shaikh, dressed in the black suit and tie of his profession, produced a gun he had smuggled into court, lunged at Raheela and shot her point-blank in the left side of the head.

"Before she fell to the ground, my wife was looking straight at me," said Sehto. The gunman, Shaikh, then tried to shoot Sehto, but was overpowered by police.

Although furious families have succeeded in killing their daughters in police custody before, it is the first time such an incident has occurred in open court.

The killer managed to evade security checks, including two sets of metal detectors and body searches, because he was one of the country's obstreperous lawyers – an entitled group that has been known to assault policemen violently.

"The lawyers, they don't like to be searched," said Amjad Shaikh, a police superintendent in Hyderabad, the main city in Pakistan's southern province of Sindh. "Security is a little bit of a problem there."

Apparently unrepentant, Shaikh gave interviews to journalists later, while in custody, saying he had "lost my mind".

"I did that in rage because she had dishonoured the family," he said to a Pakistani newspaper. Four other family members who accompanied him in court have also been charged over the killing.

"Everyone is very shocked by this because it happened in an educated family," said the police officer. "Normally, honour killings happen in the rural areas where people are not educated."

In the countryside such crimes can even be given the imprimatur of local "jirgas", informal and illegal justice systems run by communities that enforce tribal law.

The superintendent added that the involvement of the Shaikhs was also unusual, saying they are known for being "peaceful".

The Shaikhs of Sindh, originally migrants from neighbouring Punjab, tend to enjoy high levels of education, are traditionally involved in trade and are little connected with tribal custom.

According to the latest survey of violence against women by the Aurat Foundation, a rights group, there were 2,341 honour killings in 2011 in Pakistan – a 27% jump on the year before. The report also said there were more than 8,000 abductions and 3,461 rapes and gang rapes.

But the figures were just "the tip of the iceberg", it warned, saying researchers relied on those cases that were reported in the media only.

Amar Sindhu, a professor of philosophy at Sindh University and a women's rights activist, said the phenomenon was less to do with "cultural and social practices" and more to do with "the complete absence of the rule of law".

"Even in the 19th-century, the colonial authorities were able to reduce these crimes by enforcing laws when social, cultural and religious practices were just as male dominated and anti-woman as they are today," she said.

Sehto struggled to speak as he described the loss of his young wife, whom he had known for almost his entire life, growing up in the small town of Behlani.

"She was my neighbour and we went to each other's home since we were children," he said. "We began to fall in love more than 18 months ago, but they kept refusing my family's request to marry her."

Raheela agreed to elope with Sehto only after her father attempted to marry her off to a Shaikh from Punjab whom she did not know, he said.

His family has now left Behlani, and he said he will never return.

"All I want is justice, I want the court to convict Javed and his accomplices with the death penalty," he said.

Source

The Power of Dhikr (Urdu Subtitles) | Shaykh Muhammad al-Yaqoubi

Control your nafs!

Pakistan murder strikes fear in working women

Mutilated Pakistani woman rebuilds her life

A Pakistani woman whose nose was cut off by her husband 32 years ago says she has been brought back from the dead after surgery which gave her a new nose. Allah Rakhi hid her face for decades after the attack. Orla Guerin went to central Punjab to meet her.

Thirty-two years ago a teenaged mother of two set off through the lush fields of central Punjab with one thought in her mind - escape.

She was slim and spirited and famed as the beauty of her family.

Her name was Allah Rakhi, and she had just endured another beating by her husband, Ghulam Abbas.

She made it to the edge of their village, the hamlet of Thatta Pira, before he caught up with her. Within minutes the rich brown soil was running red with her blood. Ghulam Abbas had hacked off her nose.

Three decades on, still spirited but now a doting grandmother, Allah Rakhi took me to the spot at the edge of the rice fields, where she was robbed of her looks, and much of her life. Dry-eyed and animated, she relived the attack.

"He told me to sit down and listen to him," she said. "I told him he had destroyed my life, beating me every day and that I was going to my parents' house. He sat on my chest, and reached into his pocket for a blade. As he slashed my nose off, blood poured into my eyes. Then he cut my ankle, from one side to the other."

Drenched in blood she was carried back home, rather than to the hospital, so she could not make a police report. Eventually Ghulam was arrested, and spent six months in jail. Allah Rakhi agreed to his release, for the sake of their young children. When he came home he divorced her, and threw her out.

Then the gregarious and garrulous Allah Rakhi began what amounted to her own prison sentence - condemned to isolation, avoiding mirrors and hiding her face - even from her own son and daughter. "It would have been better if he had cut my throat, instead of cutting of my nose," she says.

Sitting on a traditional woven bed inside her modest home, she recalls her lost years - when she kept a piece of fabric permanently tied around her face, and shrouded herself in a veil.

Deep scar

"That's how I spent 32 years," she said.

"I never removed that fabric because it hurt to look at myself. I couldn't attend weddings or funerals, because people would keep asking what happened. If any local children came and saw me they started screaming in fright. I thought of myself as one of the dead."

Nowadays a cream scarf covers her hair, but she has no need to cover her face.

She has a ready smile and a deep scar running the length of her forehead, leading to her new nose.

It was fashioned from her ribs by Pakistan surgeon Professor Hamid Hassan, who treated her free of charge in March.

Allah Rakhi's physical and mental scars are healing, but her torment is not over yet.

She is back under the same roof with the man who mutilated her, her ex-husband Ghulam, a brooding presence with a bushy grey beard, and an incongruous floral scarf, forming a turban on his head.

As she tells me her story he sits right outside in the courtyard, listening intently. He is gnarled by age, but untouched by remorse.

When I ask about the attack his responses are prompt, and chilling.

Threatened with eviction

"What can I say about this now?" he said, in a low voice, devoid of emotion. "It's better if you don't ask. It's all her fault. Whatever happened was because of her crimes. It didn't happen for no reason." He refuses to elaborate on her alleged wrongdoing.

Allah Rakhi hears his replies, but says little in return.

"I have never punished him," she said. "I have left that to God."

Her attention is focused on the labourer, building a wall next door, under a scorching sun.

This softly spoken man in worn clothing is her son, Azhar, who is struggling to get by. Her love of him has brought her back, but it is a fraught homecoming.

"It pains me a lot to be here," she says. "I die every minute, but my son wants me here. My children are everything to me. I am happy when I see son and my grandchildren."

But Allah Rakhi may be at risk again. She says Ghulam has been harassing her since her return and threatening to evict her again. "He tells me either live as my wife or go away," she says. " I am willing to go. I am also willing to die, but I am not willing to be his wife again."

As Allah Rakhi struggles to rebuild her life, human rights campaigners here warn that other women could share her fate.

In many parts of Pakistan men still make the rules and women can be killed or maimed for breaking them. Almost 900 women were killed last year for so-called honour crimes, campaigners say, and nine women had their noses or other body parts amputated.

As the sun sets in Thatta Pira, Allah Rakhi's son Azhar is hard at work, finishing the wall brick by brick. She draws water from the well and brings him a drink.

"God will hear our prayers," she says, stroking his forehead.

And if God does not provide, then Allah Rakhi will. Now that she can show her face again, she is looking for work, so she can help her son.

And this indomitable woman has another plan. She wants to pierce her new nose.

source

Point of view

Palestinians protest murder of battered wife

The brutal killing of a battered wife in front of horrified witnesses in an open-air Bethlehem market has prompted angry accusations that Palestinian police and courts ignore violence against women.

Nancy Zaboun, a 27-year-old mother of three, had her throat slashed on Monday after seeking a divorce from her abusive husband of 10 years.

On Wednesday, several dozen women staged a memorial for Zaboun in the Bethlehem market alley where she was killed, holding signs and chanting, "No to violence against women." One sign read, "Shame on us Palestinians for killing our women."

The husband was arrested at the scene and is the prime suspect, West Bank officials said.

The case reverberated across Palestinian society because of the brutality of the attack.

However, violence against women continues to be overlooked, as in other parts of the Arab world, and women's rights activists say abusive husbands are rarely punished.

Zaboun was regularly beaten by her husband, 32-year-old Shadi Abedallah, at times so severely that she had to be hospitalised, said Khaula al-Azraq, who runs a West Bank counselling centre where Zaboun sought help.

Even so, Abedallah was never arrested. Police only made him sign pledges he would stop hitting his wife, said Azraq, adding that Abedallah himself is a former police officer.

'Family honour'

Zaboun was killed after attending a hearing in her divorce case. She was walking on the steep paths of an open-air market, not far from the Church of the Nativity, marking the traditional birthplace of Jesus, when she was fatally slashed.

Women have scored some breakthroughs in traditional Palestinian society in recent years, including gaining a greater role in public life.

However, tribal laws still remain strong, and violence against women is generally viewed by police as an internal family matter.

Azraq said violence against women appears to be on the rise because of a deteriorating economic situation and because abusers do not fear punishment.

Last year, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas signed a decree that ended a long-standing practice of treating killings within a family with leniency.

Justice Minister Ali Mohanna said such killings are now treated as any other slaying, and claims of assailants that they were protecting "family honour" are no longer taken into account.

Zaboun's husband could face life in prison if convicted, the minister said.

'Slaughtered like a sheep'

Thirteen women were killed by family members or in suspicious circumstances blamed on relatives in 2011, said Farid al-Attrash of the Palestinian Independent Commission for Human Rights.

In 2012, 12 women were killed by relatives, including three in "family honour" cases, he said. Those include suspected adultery and similar cases.

Zaboun was married at age 17, and the couple have three children, aged eight, six and three. Azraq said the beatings began immediately after the wedding.

Abdel Fattah Hemayel, the district governor of Bethlehem, said the authorities stepped in at some point, attempting to solve what he described as a family dispute.

He confirmed that the husband was asked to sign pledges to stop beating his wife.

Rabiha Diab, the women's affairs minister in the Palestinian self-rule government, said the killing of Zaboun, and the failure to prevent, it were troubling.

"Every once in a while, there is a case that makes us feel worried and afraid that we are going back to square one [as women]," she said, noting that law enforcement agencies need to look at what they can do to protect women.

She called for harsh punishment of Zaboun's killer. "We should set an example because... he slaughtered her like a sheep," she said.

Source 

Hadiqa Kaini & Dawud Wharnsby -- Kalima

Britain must defend Burma's Muslim Rohingyas

The past year has seen impressive progress in Burma – the release of Aung San Suu Kyi and hundreds of political prisoners, preliminary ceasefires with many ethnic minorities in Burma and the first elections in 20 years which saw pro-democracy candidates elected to parliament.  Alongside this internal progress, international progress is being made with sanctions being suspended and political relationships starting to form, not least with an invitation from Prime Minister David Cameron to Burma’s President Thein Sein to visit the UK later this year.  

Burma’s President Thein Sein has been working hard to convince the world his government is changing.  Yet this story of progress and reform hides a far more complex and troubling truth. Burma is taking some initial, fragile steps towards democratisation, but there is still a very, very long way to go. Several hundred political prisoners remain in jail, a brutal war continues many ethnic minorities including the predominantly Christian Kachin people in northern Burma, and there are still systematic human rights abuses – civilians in Kachin talk of forced labour, torture and extra judicial killings and at least 75,000 people have been forcibly displaced.

And there is the tragedy that is the plight of the Muslim Rohingyas. In June, a devastating cycle of violence spiralled out of control in Arakan State in western Burma. Sparked by the rape and murder of a Buddhist Rakhine woman allegedly by Muslim Rohingyas, decades of racial and religious hatred erupted into several weeks of sectarian violence in which hundreds were killed, dozens of villages torched and at least 90,000 people displaced. Both communities committed violence, but the Rohingyas were the primary victims.

The effects were seen far wider than Arakan State. Throughout Burma, and among Burmese exiled communities abroad, including in the UK, blatant and shocking anti-Muslim racism came to the fore with threats against Rohingyas as well as those who campaign for them and crude comments on social media depicting the Rohingyas as “Bengalis” and “terrorists”.

Back in Burma, as the violence subsided, the security forces began a violent crackdown going house to house arresting Rohingyas who have now seemingly disappeared without charge and without trial. Those who could flee had nowhere to run except the jungle. Those who could not flee faced jail or death. This is a human rights and humanitarian catastrophe in the making.

Underlying this entire issue is the question of citizenship. The Rohingyas have lived in Burma for generations, but under the 1982 Citizenship Law they are not recognised as citizens. The Burmese government, and many in Burmese society, describe them as “illegal immigrants”. For years, they have faced severe restrictions on marriage, movement, education and religion in Burma, because they are deemed “foreigners”. They are among the most persecuted, marginalised people in the world.

Bangladesh, however, will not take them either. Although an estimated 200,000 Rohingya refugees have lived in dire conditions along the Bangladesh-Burma border for years, Bangladesh refuses to give sanctuary to any more. Those fleeing the current crisis have been turned back from the border, sent to face an uncertain fate. Those who have escaped from Burma on boats have been turned away from Bangladesh’s shores, often to die in stormy seas or be shot at by Burmese troops.

In early July, President Thein Sein escalated the crisis even further, by reportedly telling the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees that his government will not recognise them. On the same day Britain opened a trade office in Naypyidaw and the US lifted sanctions, Thein Sein wanted to hand the entire ethnic group to the UNHCR to look after until they could be resettled in a third country. He described the 800,000 Rohingyas in Burma as “a threat to national security”.

There is an urgent need for international pressure on President Thein Sein, to repeal the 1982 Citizenship Law and introduce a new law that is based on international norms and human rights. No one born in Burma should be denied citizenship. No ethnic group should be written off as “a threat to national security”. Such racial and religious intolerance is unacceptable.

The British government must make this issue a priority. If Burma is to become a truly free nation, with all the responsibilities and benefits that come with that, it must respect human rights for all its people. Britain must push for open access for humanitarian aid and human rights monitors to all areas of Burma, the release of all political prisoners and for an immediate stop to the violence and persecution - including rewriting the Citizenship Law.  Without this, the process of reform and reconciliation in Burma cannot move forward.

Source

RAMADAN NIGHTMARE