Crazy World: Guard drowns in pond he was guarding

SAUDI ARABIA: A Filipino nursery worker in Saudi Arabia dragged a three-year-old Arab girl to the catering room and raped her before escorting her back to class.

The girl’s mother, a doctor at a local hospital, noticed her daughter was not normal when she came to the nursery to take her home as she was shivering, her face was pale and she was putting her finger in her mouth.

The girl then asked her mother to take her to the bathroom, where her mum saw blood on her underwear.

At hospital, doctors discovered semen on the girl’s clothes and determined that she had been raped.

“Police arrested the Asian worker after the girl told them what he had done to her,” Kabar daily said in a report from the northwestern town of Tabuk.

The paper quoted Tabuk police spokes man Major Khaled A- Ghabban as saying the man, a food supply worker for the nursery, had been referred to the prosecution for interrogation before trial.

Pond guard drowns in pond

AL AIN: A Pakistani man guarding a pond and a construction site in the eastern oasis town of Al Ain crowned in the pond after going into the water for his daily swim on Saturday, a newspaper said on Sunday.

Civil defence and air borne police units rushed to the site in Zakher are and plucked out Baber Basheer but he was already dead.

Witnesses said Basheer, in his 20s, took his clothes off and dived in the pond as he used to do every day but could not get out of the water.

The paper said police were investigating the incident.

Mum drives off with infant on roof

US: An infant was found plonked in the middle of a busy intersection in his car seat. The baby in the Phoenix incident was only one month old. The mother was allegedly in a drugged state and had forgotten to put the baby inside the car.

The baby's mother, who admitted she had been smoking marijuana prior to leaving her son on the roof of her car, was later booked into jail on child abuse charges, myFOXphoenix.com reported.

Officer James Holmes said that the mother of the child and her partner were on drugs and had consumed marijuana a little before driving off.

"The suspect's boyfriend and the suspect, along with her baby, left the park to purchase beer at around 11pm. The boyfriend was stopped by Phoenix officers and arrested for aggravated DUI after he was suspected of, and processed for being impaired while driving with the baby in the vehicle," Holmes told the daily.

The baby has been placed with Arizona Child Protective Services.

Man rapes and murders 7-year-old

INDIA: A man has been given the death penalty by an Indian court for raping and killing a seven-year-old child.

The judge, while reading out the stiff judgement, said that it has zero-tolerance in such cases of crime against children, reports The Times of India.

The rapist and murderer was also fined Rs1.6 lakh and the judge said that the victim's family should receive lion's share of the fine.

The incident occurred about a year ago, when the little girl had gone inside an office building in New Delhi to fetch some water.

The girl's decomposed body was found near the power room in the building a couple of days later.

The Indian daily said: "The court said the convict committed an unthinkable act of ravaging the child's body, which even an animal won't do."

About 15 injury marks were found on the child's body which "speak volumes of the brutality and force with which the innocent child had been battered to death," the daily quoted the judge.

Boy dies after being shot by younger brother
 
US: In a shocking incident, an 11-year-old child was shot to dead by his 8-year-old brother. The two siblings were playing in the woods in Pylesville when the tragedy occurred.

The elder brother died before he could be airlifted to Johns Hopkins Pediatric Center in Baltimore.

According to daily The Baltimore Sun, the boys had gotten their hands on the gun from their neighbour's place. No charges have been fined as it was an accident.

Thieves cart away ATM with $15,200

PETALING JAYA: Incidents of robbery where even the ATM machine is carted off is on the rise in Malaysia.

In yet another incident, thieves drove off into the sunset with an ATM machine, reports Asia One.

The guard who was in charge of the security in the building heard the sound of glass shattering and alerted the police. But by the time the police officials arrived, the burglars had pulled the machine out of the slot with the help of a rope, piled it up on a Toyota Avanza before fleeing the crime scene.

There were no CCTVs in the ATM room hence there is no footage to follow up on.

32 years after attack, woman gets nose

PAKISTAN: After six years of abuse, Allah Rakhi was walking out of her marriage when her husband struck again. Snatching a knife, he sliced off her nose. "You're no longer beautiful!" he shouted.

He then slashed at her foot - brutal punishment for leaving the house without his permission.

"A woman is only a woman inside the home, outside she's a whore!" he yelled at Rakhi as she lay bleeding on the dusty street just outside her home.

That was 32 years ago.

All that time, Rakhi hid her disfigured face under a veil. Then in March, a surgeon took up her case. He cut flesh from her ribs and fashioned it into a new nose, transforming her life.

While the details of every case of violence against Pakistani woman differ, many are based on a concept of "family honour." Women can be targeted for suspicion of an affair, wishing to divorce or dressing inappropriately. Hundreds women are murdered each year because of mere suspicions.

The nose is considered the symbol of family honour in Pakistan - explaining why a woman's nose is often the target of spousal abuse. A popular plea from parents to children is "Please take care of our nose," which means, "don't do anything that tarnishes the reputation of the family."

Rooted in tribal ideas that a woman's chastity is the property of the man, honour killings are practiced in much of the Arab world and South Asia. They have also been carried out by immigrants from those regions to the West.

Pakistani courts have a history of letting off offenders or giving them only light punishment, assuming the cases get to trial at all.

Rakhi's husband, for example, served just 10 months in jail before being released in exchange for a commitment to pay her medical bills. He never did.

Accurate statistics on the extent of honour crimes are hard to come by, because many cases go unreported or are settled out of court under pressure from the families of the victim and the attacker.

The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan said that in 2011, at least 943 women were murdered, nine had their noses cut off, 98 were tortured, 47 set on fire and 38 attacked with acid.

Efforts to introduce stronger laws to increase punishments for violence against women have been blocked by an Islamist political party which publicly supports the Taliban in neighbouring Afghanistan. The party, Jamiat Ulema Islam, is a member of the ruling coalition.

The lower houses of parliament passed the bill, but the JUI is preventing its passage through the upper house.

"We will never let it happen," said JUI senator Maulana Ghafoor Haideri, who said the bill was an attempt to "Westernize" Pakistan. "It will ruin our family institutions," he said.

Shad Begum, a Pakistani right activists who received the U.S. International Woman of Courage award from first lady Michelle Obama this year, said firmer laws and better enforcement are the only solution to violence against woman.

"Our leaders need to take a firm stand," she said. "If a man makes a woman a victim, or makes an 'example out of her' as he believes, our courts should also make an example out of him."

Rakhi was attacked when she was 19, after being married at 13. Despite being illegal, child marriages remain common in parts of Pakistan.

Following the attack, she worked to support herself and her daughter, painting flowers on pots in a factory and buying and selling clothes in markets across the country, all the time hidden behind a veil.

"I died every moment," Rakhi said in her three-room mud and brick house in a village hidden among the wheat fields of Pakistan's Punjab province.

Rakhi's husband divorced her soon after he was released from prison, she said.

In a bizarre twist, the 51-year-old woman now lives again under the same roof as him - something she claims as a "victory," but also perhaps points to her poverty and lack of alternatives.

Rakhi's son persuaded her to return home, anxious for her to have a more comfortable life.

On a recent visit, the husband scooted out of the house as Rakhi welcomed a reporter, and he did not make himself available for comment.

She said she never stopped hoping for a new nose, but doctors were unwilling to operate because she suffers from hepatitis C, a liver condition that can complicate surgery.

It was her daughter who gave her the chance. She was working in the capital, Islamabad, at an institute that provides training for woman recovering from having acid thrown on their faces. She introduced Rakhi to the Acid Survivors Foundation, which put her in touch with a surgeon.

Dr. Hamid Hasan took her case for free. Asked why he would take the chance, he answered, "Her pleas. Her tears."

At a follow up appointment last month, Mr Hasan touched the scars where the stitches once were on her nose and forehead.

Rakhi winced slightly, and smiled as the surgeon took his hands away.

Mr Hasan said her positive attitude was important for the other operations she must undergo in the coming months.

"Thank God I did not commit suicide," Rakhi said. "Life is a blessing!" (AP)

Image courtesy Shutterstock

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