WUNRN
AFGHANISTAN - SIGNIFICANT INCREASE
IN VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN CASES
24 October 2012 - By
Afghanistan's Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC) on Wednesday said that it recorded 550 cases of violence against women in the last month, showing a remarkable increase from previous months.
"In the last month, 550 cases of violence against including, beating,
forced marriages, murder and rape – most of them happening in the remoter
provinces of the country – have been recorded at the Human Rights
Commission," AIHRC Women's Rights Coordinator Latifa Sultani said.
Religious scholars condemned the perpetrators of the violence saying that
families who commit such deeds against women are living in ignorance, unaware
of the tenants of Islam and the rights of women.
"Families who commit any kind of violence against women are living in the
era of ignorance. We are now living in the modern era of Islam, we should fight
against such events," Afghan religious scholar Mawlawi Hedayatullah told
TOLOnews.
The Afghan Women's Network (AWN) also expressed its concerns over the
statistics saying that the numbers for last month were exceptional.
AWN chief Ferozan Mashal said she is working hard to launch an awareness
programme in order for people to know what are women's rights.
The civil society is putting pressure on different organs to enforce laws. We
also play a vital role in informing the people about what are their rights and
the laws of the country," she told TOLOnews.
In the last fortnight, severe cases of abuse have been reported in Herat
province including the beheading of a woman by her mother-in-law for refusing
to be a prostitute, and the stabbing death of a woman at the hands of her
husband.
__________________________________________________________
AFGHANISTAN - YOUNG
MARRIED WOMAN BEHEADED FOR REFUSING PROSTITUTION
AFP – 17 October 2012 - Afghan police have
arrested four people who allegedly tried to force a woman into prostitution in
western
Mah Gul, 20, was
beheaded after her mother-in-law attempted to make her sleep with a man in her
house in
"We have arrested
her mother-in-law, father-in-law, her husband and the man who killed her,"
he said.
Gul was married to her
husband four months ago and her mother-in-law had tried to force her into
prostitution several times in the past, Sayedzada said.
The suspect,
Najibullah, was paraded by police at a press conference where he said the
mother-in-law lured him into killing Gul by telling him that she was a
prostitute.
"It was around
2:00 am when Gul's husband left for his bakery. I came down and with the help
of her mother-in-law killed her with a knife," he said.
The murder comes
against a backdrop of a world outcry over the shooting by Taliban Islamists of
a 14-year-old Pakistani girl, Malala Yousafzai, who had become a voice against
the suppression of women's rights.
While Yousafzai's case
has made world headlines, people using social media in
Abdul Qader Rahimi,
the regional director of the government-backed human rights commission in
western
"There is no
doubt violence against women has increased. So far this year we have registered
100 cases of violence against women in the western region," he said,
adding that many cases go unreported.
"But at least in
Gul's case, we are glad the murderer has been arrested and brought to
justice," he said.
Last year, in a case
that made international headlines, police rescued a teenage girl, Sahar Gul,
who was beaten and locked up in a toilet for five months after she defied her
in-laws who tried to force her into prostitution.