ISIS sex slaves subjected to rape freed by secret resistance network

Women and young girls held as sex slaves by depraved Islamic State militants are fleeing their captors with the help of a heroic underground network of resistance fighters. Risking certain death and torture in a bid to flee their brutal oppressors, many spend several days making their way through Syria and Iraq to the safety of government-controlled territory. Many of them have been subjected to appalling violence, rape and sexual abuse at the hands of ISIS fighters and commanders.

ISIS has carried out 'systematic sexual crimes' against girls from the Yazidi community since kidnapping more than 3,000 girls from their homes in northern Iraq last August. Unjustly regarded as ‘devil worshippers’ on account of their unusual beliefs, the Yazidi have for centuries been one of the most persecuted minorities of the Middle East. Islamic extremists regard them as infidels, worthy only of being killed. Those considered the 'most beautiful' by ISIS leaders are sent to horrendous auction houses where they are stripped naked and sold to the highest bidder.

More at Daily Mail Online

UN peacekeepers gave Haitian women food in exchange for sex

United Nations peacekeepers gave more than 225 Haitian women food and medicine in exchange for sex, according to an internal report on exploitation that The Associated Press obtained. The draft by the Office of Internal Oversight Services looks at the way UN peacekeeping, which has about 125,000 people in some of the world’s most troubled areas, deals with the persistent problem of sexual abuse and exploitation.

Expected to be released this month, the report says major challenges remain a decade after a groundbreaking UN report first tackled the issue. Among its findings: About a third of alleged sexual abuse involves minors. “For rural women, hunger, lack of shelter, baby care items, medication and household items were frequently cited as the ‘triggering need,’ ” the report says.

NY Daily News

The orphans of Ebola

Orphans who survived Ebola in Sierra Leone are starving to death amid harvest shortages and some are being forced into the sex industry to pay for food. Researchers from British charity Street Child warn the situation will deteriorate if seeds are not distributed before the rains begin this month and planting becomes possible.

The charity, which has already received distressing reports of children dying due to a lack of food in rural parts on the country, has estimated there to be 12,000 orphans, many of whom are now forced to look after themselves. The charity has found that some children, rejected by their friends because of the stigma of Ebola, have tried to commit suicide, while girls are being forced into the sex industry to earn money to buy food.

Research team leader John Pryor said: 'Many rural communities which were under quarantine due to Ebola have lost their harvests and the people are truly suffering. 'As a result they have nothing to plant prior to the rainy season, which is traditionally known as the hunger season. 'The most vulnerable, including many Ebola orphans, are dangerously hungry already, before it has even begun. Add to this the risk of no harvest to look forward to and the potential consequences are awful.' Without a harvest, the most vulnerable will starve.

More at Daily Mail Online

India Asks YouTube To Remove Delhi Rape Documentary

India has asked YouTube to remove all links to a controversial documentary about the gang rape and murder of a woman in Delhi after banning its broadcast, a government official told Reuters on Thursday.
Leslee Udwin's "India's Daughter" features an interview with Mukesh Singh, one of four men sentenced to death for the rape and torture of a 23-year-old woman on a moving bus in December 2012.
Comments released to the media show that Singh blames the victim for the crime. He says that women are more responsible than men for rape.
"We just forwarded the court order and asked them (YouTube) to comply," an official at the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology told Reuters.

More at Huff. Post

It’s Her Fault She Was Gang Raped, Says Rapist

"Indian authorities ordered television stations Tuesday not to broadcast a documentary about a gang rape on a New Delhi bus in which one of the attackers blames the victim and says she could have avoided being killed if she had not fought back, a government official said.
The order followed an outcry over giving a convicted prisoner a nationwide platform to express repugnant views about a horrific crime that shocked Indians and prompted hundreds of thousands to take to the streets in protest. In response to the 2012 attack, India's government rushed through legislation doubling prison terms for rapists to 20 years and criminalizing voyeurism, stalking and the trafficking of women.” *

The Young Turks

Prince Andrew and the under-age 'sex slave'

British Prince Andrew abused an underage girl at an orgy where she was being used as a sex slave, it was sensationally claimed last night. In an extraordinary legal allegation, a woman said she was ‘forced’ to have sex with him at parties in London, New York and the Caribbean.

Last night the prince issued a strongly-worded denial, with Buckingham Palace saying ‘any suggestion of impropriety with underage minors is categorically untrue’. But his alleged victim immediately hit back by saying she would not be ‘bullied into silence by aggressive attacks’.

More at Daily Mail Online – The Guardian

The Queens Arrest Is Imminent - The Queen has granted herself (and her family) a new right of absolutely secrecy unsurpassed in British history, in an attempt to cover up paedophile claims and arrest warrants. Truth Seeker

They Put Her In Solitary Confinement For 7 Months. Before That, She Was In A Prison Full Of Men

Because, while Johanna is a woman, she is also transgender. And because of her gender identity, Johanna's life is in constant danger. The bias and hatred against transgender women is very real, as Johanna's story sadly shows. Often, the people who commit violence against transgender women assume that they must be gay men because they might wear make-up or might wear their hair long.

Not only is she a transgender woman, she is a transgender woman who crossed the U.S. border undocumented. This makes things more complicated. Because, unfortunately, she didn't find help. Instead, she found herself in the immigration detention system. Johanna was placed in a jail — with men.

...being locked up was a nightmare. She was beat up by a male cellmate. Then, guards told her the only safe way to house her was solitary confinement. There, she sat in a 6-by-13-foot cell for 23 hours a day with no human contact and no view of the outside world. She waited for an asylum decision for seven months. Johanna decided that going back home was far better than being locked up in solitary confinement. She was deported to El Salvador. Almost as soon as her plane landed in the San Salvador airport, more nightmares followed.

upworthy.com

Violence Against Women and the Athletic Industrial Complex

US Church Official Confused About Legality Of Sex With Children

Acid attacks rising against Colombia's women

At least five people have been attacked with acid in Colombia over the past two weeks. Until now, authorities have done little to address the problem. But a high profile case in the capital Bogota has pushed the government into restricting acid sales, and increase penalties. Al Jazeera's Alessandro Rampietti reports from Bogota.

Why do Arab men hate women?

Why do they hate us? With these five words in a controversial magazine article, Egyptian-American journalist Mona Eltahawy shot to fame, unleashing a devastating critique of womens rights in the Arab world.In the season premiere of Head to Head , Mehdi Hasan challenges Eltahawy on her views regarding the status of women in Arab states.Are Arab or Muslim societies inherently patriarchal? And how does the narrative of Islam as sexist play into geo-politics and Western stereotypes of the Middle East?

See the "About" on YouTube

Banaz A Love Story

Banaz Mahmod was murdered by her own family, in an honour killing. This film tells Banaz’s story, in her own words, for the first time – and tells the story of the extraordinary police team who refused to give up, and finally brought her killers to justice.

This is a documentary film chronicling an act of overwhelming horror – the honour killing of Banaz Mahmod, a young British woman in suburban London in 2006, killed and “disappeared” by her own family, with the agreement and help of a large section of the Kurdish community, because she tried to choose a life for herself.

Fuuse

How to Not Get Raped

Female Saudi Student Dies When Staff Block Male Paramedics

Thousands of Saudis vented their anger online over a report Thursday that staff at a Riyadh university had barred male paramedics from entering a women's-only campus to assist a student who had suffered a heart attack and later died.

The Okaz newspaper said administrators at the King Saud University impeded efforts by the paramedics to save the student's life because of rules banning men from being onsite. According to the paper, the incident took place on Wednesday and the university staff took an hour before allowing the paramedics in.

Amna Bawazeer suffered a heart attack and collapsed suddenly on the campus on Wednesday. Her death sparked a debate on Twitter by Saudis who created a hashtag to talk about the incident. In the debate, many Saudis said the kingdom's strictly enforced rules governing the segregation of the sexes were to blame for the delay in helping Bawazeer. Saudi Arabia follows a strict interpretation of Islam. Sexes are segregated in schools and almost all Saudi universities. Women also have separate seating areas and often separate entrances in "family" sections of restaurants and cafes where single males are not allowed. The kingdom's top cleric has warned against the mixing of the genders, saying it poses a threat to female chastity and society.

Huff. Post

UN Report Denounces Vatican For Sex Abuse And Stands On Contraception, Abortion And Homosexuality

A U.N. human rights committee denounced the Vatican on Wednesday for adopting policies that allowed priests to rape and molest tens of thousands of children over decades, and urged it to open its files on the pedophiles and the churchmen who concealed their crimes.

In a devastating report, the U.N. committee also severely criticized the Holy See for its attitudes toward homosexuality, contraception and abortion and said it should review its policies to ensure children's rights and their access to health care are guaranteed.

On sex abuse, "the committee is gravely concerned that the Holy See has not acknowledged the extent of the crimes committed, has not taken the necessary measures to address cases of child sexual abuse and to protect children, and has adopted policies and practices which have led to the continuation of the abuse by, and the impunity of, the perpetrators," the report said.

It called for the sex abuse commission that Pope Francis announced in December to conduct an independent investigation of all cases of priestly abuse and the way the Catholic hierarchy has responded over time, and urged the Holy See establish clear rules for the mandatory reporting of abuse to police.

See Huff. Post

New Afghanistan law to silence victims of violence against women

A new Afghan law will allow men to attack their wives, children and sisters without fear of judicial punishment, undoing years of slow progress in tackling violence in a country blighted by so-called "honour" killings, forced marriage and vicious domestic abuse.

The small but significant change to Afghanistan's criminal prosecution code bans relatives of an accused person from testifying against them. Most violence against women in Afghanistan is within the family, so the law – passed by parliament but awaiting the signature of the president, Hamid Karzai – will effectively silence victims as well as most potential witnesses to their suffering.

"It is a travesty this is happening," said Manizha Naderi, director of the charity and campaign group Women for Afghan Women. "It will make it impossible to prosecute cases of violence against women … The most vulnerable people won't get justice now."

More on The Guardian

Homoerotic Homophobes

'Some girls enjoy rape', Israeli judge tells court

An Israeli judge has caused widespread outrage after announcing to a court that "some girls enjoy being raped" during a hearing centred on the gang rape of 13-year-old girl.

The hearing was to debate whether the rape of the young Israeli Jewish teen by four Palestinian youths from the Shuafat refugee camp was an act of terrorism, and thus the girl would be entitled to compensation from the state. The four were captured, convicted and imprisoned, but the Defense Ministry ruled that the rape was not a “hostile act” — that is, an act of political aggression. This meant the victim was not be entitled to government compensation and other benefits which terror victims receive. The Defense Ministry oversees criminal cases involving West Bank Palestinians.

During a heated debate, Judge Nissim Yeshaya of Tel Aviv District Court said: "There are some girls who enjoy being raped".

Times of Israel

Rape victim and 'black virgin' condemned to die in Pakistan over rape

When she was gang-raped by four men at the age of 13, her village classed her as a "black virgin" and ordered her killed. In the rural village of Dadu in southern Pakistan, tradition held that Kainat Soomro's own family should murder her, as her sexual assault had made her a token of disgrace.

Four years later, Kainat is alive and a documentary about her story is premiering on television in the US. But that doesn't mean she or her family is safe. As the film Outlawed in Pakistan shows, Kainat Soomro is still "destined to be killed" because she took the step - extraordinary in Pakistan - of fighting for justice.

The film is a testament to her family’s strength and endurance in a life which has only become more difficult the longer they have stood up against tradition. The Soomros have faced isolation, fear and intimidation from the four men Kainat accused of raping her, and from the members of the small village who were afraid of challenging moral laws which have been in existence for centuries. By virtue of making the rape accusation, Kainat is an outlaw in her own country.

The Australian – Facebook

Iran moves to legalize marriage for girls under 10 years old

When Saudi Arabia announced three months ago that girls as young as 10-years old would now be allowed to marry, Iran decided to drop the age limit even further.

Iranian Christian news service Mohabat News reports a member of the Iranian Parliament (Majiles) Mohammad Ali Isfenani, "we must regard 9 as being the appropriate age for a girl to have reached puberty and qualified to get married. To do otherwise would be to contradict and challenge Islamic Sharia law."

He argues,"Before the revolution girls under 16 were not allowed to marry. Parents determined to get around the law would often tamper with their daughter's birth certificate. Under the previous constitution, people were legally regarded as adults when they were 18. After the revolution the age at which children were regarded as going through puberty was lowered to 9 for girls and 15 for boys.

Mohabat News reports statistics that show over the past few weeks, over 75 female children under 10 were forced to marry much older men. And in nearly 4000 cases, both the bride and groom were under 14.

From digitaljournal.com