Re: Muslim attitudes towards rape [split: Muslim Women Gang Raped.. ]
Saudia Arabia and Aids
In June, the Ministry of Health announced that more than 10,000 people in Saudi Arabia were infected with the virus, HIV, or had AIDS, including nearly 600 children. The numbers appear to show a sharp increase in infection over 2004, when 7,800 cases were reported, and 2003, when 6,700 cases were reported.
Officials say that better reporting is the reason for the growing numbers. But many doctors say even the latest figures are off, with the real numbers likely to be far higher in this country of 27 million people. One physician who has treated many patients who have been hiding their condition or were unaware of it estimated that the real number could be as high as 80,000.
Women in Pakistan face spiralling rates of gender-based violence, a legal framework that is deeply biased against women, and a law enforcement system that re-traumatizes female victims instead of facilitating justice," according to a 1999 report by Human Rights Watch. Citing domestic violence rates as high as 90 per cent, at least eight reported rapes every 24 hours nationwide, and an alarming rise in so-called “honour” killings, the report states that such crimes continue to be perpetrated with near total impunity.
The report says law enforcement authorities routinely dismiss domestic violence as private disputes. Female victims attempting to register complaints of abuse are invariably turned away, and are regularly advised and sometimes pressured by the police to reconcile with their abusive spouses or relatives.
Women who report rape or sexual assault by strangers are often disbelieved and treated with disrespect. They must contend with abusive police, forensic doctors who focus on their virginity status instead of their injuries, untrained prosecutors, sceptical judges, and a discriminatory and deficient legal framework. “Only the most resilient and resourceful complainants can manoeuvre such hostile terrain,” says the report. “And those who do seldom see their attackers punished.”
Pakistan’s rape law, the Offence of Zina Ordinance, allows marital rape, does not establish the crime of statutory rape, and in some cases does not permit the female victim to testify.
The report says women’s rights advocacy organizations have been subjected to intimidation, including government surveillance and threats that they would be banned.
Source: Human Rights Watch. 1999. Crime or Custom: Violence against Women in Pakistan. Web site: <www.hrw.org/reports/1999/pakistan>.
Women Living Under Muslim Law has mounted a World Wide Web campaign around the denial of women’s rights in Islamic societies; it directs support to the Association of the Women of Afghanistan, among others. WomenNet in South Africa used the Internet for a Stop Rape campaign supported by international signatories.