Indian police fired water cannon yesterday at a group of mainly women protesting against the gang rape and lynching of two girls in the country’s north, television footage showed.
Several hundred protesters were demanding an end to violence against women at the protest outside the office of the chief minister of the state of Uttar Pradesh, where the gang-rapes occurred.
“We’re not going to sleep, we’ll be here, they have to stop this [violence against women],” one protester told the NDTV network during the demonstration in the city of Lucknow.
“We’re going to stay here, we’re not going to give up,” one middle-aged man said before the crowd was drenched by riot police.
The two cousins, aged 14 and 12, were found hanging from a mango tree in their impoverished village on Wednesday morning last week, with subsequent tests showing they had been the victim of multiple sexual assaults.
The girls had apparently gone into the fields on Tuesday night to relieve themselves because their home, like most in the state’s Badaun District, did not have toilets.
Outrage is growing over the attacks after the girls’ fathers accused local police of refusing to help find those responsible because they belonged to a low caste.
India revised its laws on sex attacks in the wake of the December 2012 gang rape of a student on a bus in New Delhi which triggered outrage, but they have done little to stem the tide of sex attacks.
Mass protests erupted in Delhi and elsewhere over that attack, which unleashed seething anger at India’s treatment of women.
Rights activists and politicians said the latest cases showed authorities in Uttar Pradesh were “not serious” about tackling sexual crimes.
Asked at a press conference last week about the incidence of rapes in the state, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav told a female reporter: “You haven’t been harmed, have you? No, right? Great. Thank you.”
The head of Uttar Pradesh’s ruling party, Mulayam Singh Yadav, who is also the chief minister’s father, sparked uproar during the recent election campaign when he said rapists should not receive the death penalty because “boys will be boys.”
Police have arrested five people in connection with the attacks on the girls and a federal police investigation has been ordered.
‘GREAT OPPRTUNITY’: The Paraguayan president made the remarks following Donald Trump’s tapping of several figures with deep Latin America expertise for his Cabinet Paraguay President Santiago Pena called US president-elect Donald Trump’s incoming foreign policy team a “dream come true” as his nation stands to become more relevant in the next US administration. “It’s a great opportunity for us to advance very, very fast in the bilateral agenda on trade, security, rule of law and make Paraguay a much closer ally” to the US, Pena said in an interview in Washington ahead of Trump’s inauguration today. “One of the biggest challenges for Paraguay was that image of an island surrounded by land, a country that was isolated and not many people know about it,”
DIALOGUE: US president-elect Donald Trump on his Truth Social platform confirmed that he had spoken with Xi, saying ‘the call was a very good one’ for the US and China US president-elect Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) discussed Taiwan, trade, fentanyl and TikTok in a phone call on Friday, just days before Trump heads back to the White House with vows to impose tariffs and other measures on the US’ biggest rival. Despite that, Xi congratulated Trump on his second term and pushed for improved ties, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs said. The call came the same day that the US Supreme Court backed a law banning TikTok unless it is sold by its China-based parent company. “We both attach great importance to interaction, hope for
‘FIGHT TO THE END’: Attacking a court is ‘unprecedented’ in South Korea and those involved would likely face jail time, a South Korean political pundit said Supporters of impeached South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol yesterday stormed a Seoul court after a judge extended the impeached leader’s detention over his ill-fated attempt to impose martial law. Tens of thousands of people had gathered outside the Seoul Western District Court on Saturday in a show of support for Yoon, who became South Korea’s first sitting head of state to be arrested in a dawn raid last week. After the court extended his detention on Saturday, the president’s supporters smashed windows and doors as they rushed inside the building. Hundreds of police officers charged into the court, arresting dozens and denouncing an
RELEASE: The move follows Washington’s removal of Havana from its list of terrorism sponsors. Most of the inmates were arrested for taking part in anti-government protests Cuba has freed 127 prisoners, including opposition leader Jose Daniel Ferrer, in a landmark deal with departing US President Joe Biden that has led to emotional reunions across the communist island. Ferrer, 54, is the most high-profile of the prisoners that Cuba began freeing on Wednesday after Biden agreed to remove the country from Washington’s list of terrorism sponsors — part of an eleventh-hour bid to cement his legacy before handing power on Monday to US president-elect Donald Trump. “Thank God we have him home,” Nelva Ortega said of her husband, Ferrer, who has been in and out of prison for the
RSS