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Pakistan's tribal justice for women

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Rape, mutilation: Pakistan's tribal justice for women

By Rebecca Conway, MULTAN, Pakistan | Fri Aug 12, 2011 6:08pm EDT

(Reuters) - On April 14, two men entered Asma Firdous' home, cut off six of her fingers, slashed her arms and lips and then sliced off her nose. Before leaving the house, the men locked their 28-year-old victim inside.

Asma, from impoverished Kohaur Junobi village in Pakistan's south, was mutilated because her husband was involved in a dispute with his relatives, and they wanted revenge.

Her fate is familiar in parts of Pakistan's remote and feudal agricultural belts, where women are often used as bargaining chips in family feuds, and where the level of violence they face is increasing in frequency and brutality.

At the hospital in nearby Multan town, Asma's shocked parents sat quietly by her bedside and struggled to explain what the future holds for their now disfigured daughter.

"I don't know what will happen to her when she leaves here," Asma's father, Ghulam Mustafa, said, in a dilapidated ward heavy with the smell of antiseptic and blood, where other women, doused with acid or kerosene by relatives or fellow villagers, awaiting an equally uncertain future.

Asked if Asma will return to her husband, her father remains silent.

Pakistan is the world's third-most dangerous country for women, after Afghanistan and the Democratic Republic of Congo, based on a survey conducted by the Thomson Reuters Foundation

In its 2010 report, the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan says almost 800 women were victims of "honor killings" -- murders aimed at preserving the honor of male relatives -- and 2,900 women reported raped -- almost eight a day.

The bulk, or almost 2,600, were raped in Punjab alone, Pakistan's most populous province.

And the numbers are rising: media reports say crimes against women have risen 18 percent in the year to May and the human rights commission believes its figures represent only a fraction of the attacks which take place across the country.

Dr. Farzana Bari, director of Gender Studies at Quaid-e-Azam University, says Pakistan's patriarchal society often condones discrimination against women, which is more prevalent among poor and uneducated rural families.

That mindset can often influence the police and judiciary, which sometimes turn a blind eye to honor killings or rapes carried out to "punish" women.

"I think honor killings are a symptom of vigilante justice," she said. "And vigilante justice occurs in an environment where the state is unable to enforce its writ."

TRIBAL JUSTICE

In rural areas, women are often shut out of the justice system, which is compromised by powerful landowners and feudal lords who dominate a hierarchy that makes it difficult -- and deadly -- for those with little education or social standing to speak out.

Families or tribes then often take justice in their own hands, presiding over "jirgas" or "panchayats" -- gatherings of elders that hand down punishments that include rape, killing or barter of women for crimes that include falling in love with a man deemed inappropriate or besmirching family honor.

Some women are maimed just to settle scores.

Members of the panchayat systems say the tradition is hard to shake because it is entrenched in the local culture and also because it is much more efficient than the regular courts.

"In the settled areas there are courts but people can't always get justice or compensation," said lawyer and tribal elder Karim Masoud, who presides over both panchayat settlements and the mainstream court system.

"With the jirgas, they can get compensation, and it takes less time to settle a dispute. It's fairer and people don't have to use bribes to get justice."

Zarmuhamad Afridi, who also attends jirga rulings in Pakistan's northern tribal belt and works within the mainstream court system, said the jirga system survives because in many parts of Pakistan, a man's honor is intrinsically linked to how his wife or daughter behave.

"If a couple is not married and they are having a relationship, a jirga may rule that the woman should be shot," Afridi said. "That is okay for many, because they have to protect family honor."

The slightest transgression by a woman -- being seen talking to a man on the street, perhaps, or having an unknown phone number in a mobile -- can bring harsh punishment and social ostracism of the family, he says, making the quick, harsh judgment of the panchayats popular.

"Women are cherished here," he said. "Men protect them. If a woman is out of her house then what is she doing? That is what people think here."

Many women are unable to speak out because they lack the support and education to understand their rights, activists say.

But even those who dare often get nowhere.

The most high profile instance of a violent ruling by a tribal court against a woman is that of the gang rape of Mukhtaran Mai, which took place near Multan in 2002.

Mai was allegedly attacked to settle a matter of village honor, as decided by a panchayat. She was then paraded naked through her village.

Unlike most rape victims, who face stark recriminations for speaking out, and who are sometimes even expected to commit suicide, she filed a criminal case against 14 men.

Six men were convicted and sentenced to death that year, but in 2005 the Lahore High Court commuted one sentence to life in prison and acquitted the rest.

Pakistan's Supreme Court upheld that decision in April this year, in what rights activists said was a crushing blow to women's and minority rights in Pakistan.

The men were released days later. Mai said she is afraid they will return and kill her.

Ali Dayan Hasan, senior researcher at Human Rights Watch's South Asia division, said the lack of justice for women in cases like such as Mai's is "a structural failing of the criminal justice system".

"The verdict also lays bare the misogyny of Pakistan's judicial system because it is a judiciary that is instinctively unsympathetic to women."

Rape, mutilation: Pakistan's tribal justice for women | Reuters
 
what about abu gharib sir...your sexually challenged soldiers men and women raped iraqi civilians....imagine invaders raping the poor ....also what goes on on bagram and gitmo...its not a secret....rape is common in your army

1/3rd of Women in US Military Raped | NEWS JUNKIE POST

what goes on in Pakistan is none of your business...we are not your colony or a state and all these links are reported with a bias and non authentic.
why dident u reported such stuff before 9/11??
now you are losing the war....so u wanna start propoganda warfare which is cheaper:lol:

blacks were supposed to sit at the back of the buses uptil 1950's ...they fought for your country in ww1 and ww2 and sacrificed but werent supposed to sit at the front of the bus....cool story......


you cheer when u blow and mutilate civilians in drones..
Shocking video shows U.S. troops cheering as airstrike blows up Afghan civilians | Mail Online

how long will you lie....bankruptcy and recession is just around the corner sir.
 
Sir, you have chosen a very appropriate user name for your posts here at the PDF. To understand you and the credibility of your pronouncements, one need only know your hero. Enough said. TS.
____________________________________________________

Paul Joseph Goebbels; 29 October 1897 – 1 May 1945; was a German politician and Reich Minister of Propaganda in Nazi Germany from 1933 to 1945. As one of Adolf Hitler's closest associates and most devout followers, he was known for his zealous oratory and anti-Semitism. He played a hand in the Kristallnacht attack on the German Jews, which many historians consider to be the beginning of the Final Solution, leading towards the Holocaust.

Goebbels earned a Ph.D. from Heidelberg University in 1921, writing his doctoral thesis on 18th century romantic drama; he then went on to work as a journalist and later a bank clerk and caller on the stock exchange. He also wrote novels and plays, but they were rejected by publishers. Goebbels came into contact with the Nazi Party in 1923 during the French occupation of the Ruhr and became a member in 1924. He was appointed Gauleiter (regional party leader) of Berlin. In this position, he put his propaganda skills to full use, combating the local socialist and communist parties with the help of Nazi papers and the paramilitary Stormtroopers, aka, Brownshirts, SA. By 1928, he had risen in the party ranks to become one of its most prominent members.

Goebbels rose to power in 1933 along with Hitler and the Nazi Party and he was appointed Propaganda Minister. One of his first acts was the burning of books rejected by the Nazis. He exerted totalitarian control over the media, arts and information in Germany.

From the beginning of his tenure, Goebbels organized attacks on German Jews, commencing with the one-day boycott of Jewish businessmen, doctors, and lawyers[3] on April 1, 1933.[4] His attacks on the Jewish population culminated in the Kristallnacht assault of 1938, an open and unrestrained pogrom unleashed by the Nazis all across Germany, in which scores of synagogues were burned and hundreds of Jews were assaulted and murdered.[5] Further, he produced a series of anti-Semitic films (most notably Jud Suss). Goebbels used modern propaganda techniques to psychologically prepare the German people for aggressive warfare.

During World War II, Goebbels increased his power and influence through shifting alliances with other Nazi leaders. By late 1943, the tide of the war was turning against the Axis powers, but this only spurred Goebbels to intensify the propaganda by urging the Germans to accept the idea of total war and mobilization. Goebbels remained with Hitler in Berlin to the end; just hours after Hitler's suicide, Goebbels and his wife, Magda, killed their six young children. Then, they both committed suicide as well.
 
Sir, you have chosen a very appropriate user name for your posts here at the PDF. To understand you and the credibility of your pronouncements, one need only know your hero. Enough said. TS.
____________________________________________________

Paul Joseph Goebbels; 29 October 1897 – 1 May 1945; was a German politician and Reich Minister of Propaganda in Nazi Germany from 1933 to 1945. As one of Adolf Hitler's closest associates and most devout followers, he was known for his zealous oratory and anti-Semitism. He played a hand in the Kristallnacht attack on the German Jews, which many historians consider to be the beginning of the Final Solution, leading towards the Holocaust.

Goebbels earned a Ph.D. from Heidelberg University in 1921, writing his doctoral thesis on 18th century romantic drama; he then went on to work as a journalist and later a bank clerk and caller on the stock exchange. He also wrote novels and plays, but they were rejected by publishers. Goebbels came into contact with the Nazi Party in 1923 during the French occupation of the Ruhr and became a member in 1924. He was appointed Gauleiter (regional party leader) of Berlin. In this position, he put his propaganda skills to full use, combating the local socialist and communist parties with the help of Nazi papers and the paramilitary Stormtroopers, aka, Brownshirts, SA. By 1928, he had risen in the party ranks to become one of its most prominent members.

Goebbels rose to power in 1933 along with Hitler and the Nazi Party and he was appointed Propaganda Minister. One of his first acts was the burning of books rejected by the Nazis. He exerted totalitarian control over the media, arts and information in Germany.

From the beginning of his tenure, Goebbels organized attacks on German Jews, commencing with the one-day boycott of Jewish businessmen, doctors, and lawyers[3] on April 1, 1933.[4] His attacks on the Jewish population culminated in the Kristallnacht assault of 1938, an open and unrestrained pogrom unleashed by the Nazis all across Germany, in which scores of synagogues were burned and hundreds of Jews were assaulted and murdered.[5] Further, he produced a series of anti-Semitic films (most notably Jud Suss). Goebbels used modern propaganda techniques to psychologically prepare the German people for aggressive warfare.

During World War II, Goebbels increased his power and influence through shifting alliances with other Nazi leaders. By late 1943, the tide of the war was turning against the Axis powers, but this only spurred Goebbels to intensify the propaganda by urging the Germans to accept the idea of total war and mobilization. Goebbels remained with Hitler in Berlin to the end; just hours after Hitler's suicide, Goebbels and his wife, Magda, killed their six young children. Then, they both committed suicide as well.

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Pakistan is the world's third-most dangerous country for women, after Afghanistan and the Democratic Republic of Congo, based on a survey conducted by the Thomson Reuters Foundation


Wow 3rd worst in the world i never knew that!
 
it simply disgusts me that people of Pakistan when presented with the dark side end up putting up their escape theory where they say that 'this happens here so what, that happens there'...
its just like saying that my evil is smaller than yours..

any ways sad news, I guess nothing will be done, there is no Justice in this misogynist society
 
Pakistan is the world's third-most dangerous country for women, after Afghanistan and the Democratic Republic of Congo, based on a survey conducted by the Thomson Reuters Foundation


Wow 3rd worst in the world i never knew that!

India is doing just as badly , 4th most dangerous in the world.
 
Sir, you have chosen a very appropriate user name for your posts here at the PDF. To understand you and the credibility of your pronouncements, one need only know your hero. Enough said. TS.
____________________________________________________

Paul Joseph Goebbels; 29 October 1897 – 1 May 1945; was a German politician and Reich Minister of Propaganda in Nazi Germany from 1933 to 1945. As one of Adolf Hitler's closest associates and most devout followers, he was known for his zealous oratory and anti-Semitism. He played a hand in the Kristallnacht attack on the German Jews, which many historians consider to be the beginning of the Final Solution, leading towards the Holocaust.

Goebbels earned a Ph.D. from Heidelberg University in 1921, writing his doctoral thesis on 18th century romantic drama; he then went on to work as a journalist and later a bank clerk and caller on the stock exchange. He also wrote novels and plays, but they were rejected by publishers. Goebbels came into contact with the Nazi Party in 1923 during the French occupation of the Ruhr and became a member in 1924. He was appointed Gauleiter (regional party leader) of Berlin. In this position, he put his propaganda skills to full use, combating the local socialist and communist parties with the help of Nazi papers and the paramilitary Stormtroopers, aka, Brownshirts, SA. By 1928, he had risen in the party ranks to become one of its most prominent members.

Goebbels rose to power in 1933 along with Hitler and the Nazi Party and he was appointed Propaganda Minister. One of his first acts was the burning of books rejected by the Nazis. He exerted totalitarian control over the media, arts and information in Germany.

From the beginning of his tenure, Goebbels organized attacks on German Jews, commencing with the one-day boycott of Jewish businessmen, doctors, and lawyers[3] on April 1, 1933.[4] His attacks on the Jewish population culminated in the Kristallnacht assault of 1938, an open and unrestrained pogrom unleashed by the Nazis all across Germany, in which scores of synagogues were burned and hundreds of Jews were assaulted and murdered.[5] Further, he produced a series of anti-Semitic films (most notably Jud Suss). Goebbels used modern propaganda techniques to psychologically prepare the German people for aggressive warfare.

During World War II, Goebbels increased his power and influence through shifting alliances with other Nazi leaders. By late 1943, the tide of the war was turning against the Axis powers, but this only spurred Goebbels to intensify the propaganda by urging the Germans to accept the idea of total war and mobilization. Goebbels remained with Hitler in Berlin to the end; just hours after Hitler's suicide, Goebbels and his wife, Magda, killed their six young children. Then, they both committed suicide as well.

Are you intentially making this big a diversion/red herring or are doing it out of stupidity?
 
so you mean that its all right to close your eyes & put up your escape theory & pretend that nothing is wrong?

No.... but we have been listening to their nonsense for quite sometime .... it is high time we showed them their own face in the mirror
 
What goes on here regarding women is wrong but americans have domestic violence too. However these articles are propaganda by americans to undermine pakiistan. As John lennon said woman is the nigger of the world.
 
feudel lords do much mote than disfiguring women...until feudelism is not abolished such incidents cannot be stopped...
the trouble is that most of pakistani population lives in villages and billages belong to one feudel lord or another.
 

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