Maid 'torched' in gang rape
2005-01-10 10:54
Karachi, Pakistan - A 16-year-old maid was allegedly raped and then set on fire by three men in a home in this southern Pakistani city, police said on Monday.
The victim was working at the home of a Karachi businessman in the city's eastern Bahadurabad neighborhood when she was attacked and allegedly burned late on Saturday night, said Tariq Malik, a Karachi police official.
Police have arrested the son of the maid's employer and are searching for two other men, believed to be friends of the employer's son, Malik said.
The men allegedly doused the girl with kerosene and set her on fire after she threatened to report them following the sexual assault, according to Malik.
Scared by the girl's screams, the suspects put out the flames and took the girl to a state-run hospital, Malik said.
Qarar Abbasi, a doctor at the Civil Hospital, said the girl had burns on 90% of her body. She was listed in serious condition.
Violence against women is not uncommon in Pakistan. So-called honour killings, where women are targeted after they are suspected of having an affair or marrying someone not accepted by their parents, claims hundreds of lives a year.
The government has pledged to crack down on the practice since a highly publicised case in 2002, when a village council in eastern Pakistan ordered a woman gang-raped as punishment for her brother's sexual relations with another woman. A court later convicted six men and sentenced them to death. They are appealing.
- AP