NEW DELHI: Claims of police incompetence and public apathy stirred fresh outrage on Saturday in the case of a New Delhi gang-rape victim after her boyfriend recounted witnessing the horrific crime for the first time.
The man was also badly injured as he tried to prevent the assault on a moving bus on December 16 which has stirred violent protests and a bout of soul-searching about the treatment of women and rising sex crime in India.
Speaking to AFP and an Indian news channel, the boyfriend said passers-by ignored the naked and bloodied couple for 30 minutes after they were thrown out of the bus and police then wasted more time arguing over who had jurisdiction.
“A passer-by found us (after the attack), but he did not even give my friend his jacket,” he told AFP in the interview which also raised questions about the medical treatment given to the woman at a government hospital.
The claims came as a trial of five suspects started in a district court in south Delhi where the accused have been ordered to appear together for the first time on Monday.
In addition to rape, kidnap and robbery, they face a murder charge and possibly the death penalty after the 23-year-old victim died last weekend from her horrific injuries, including internal wounds caused by an iron bar.
“The cruelty I saw should not be seen ever,” the man, who cannot be named for legal reasons, told AFP of the savagery of the assault which started after the couple were lured onto the bus after watching a film together.
Speaking to the Hindi-language Zee News channel, he said it took 90 minutes for the injured pair to reach hospital because passers-by ignored their pleas for help, and police were late to arrive and then needlessly delayed.
“They could have taken us to hospital, given us clothes in that crucial one-and-a-half hours. For a dying person every minute is important,” he told the channel.
Facing angry criticism on the streets, where protests have raged over the last three weeks against the lack of safety in the Indian capital, the police issued a hasty rebuttal.
A senior officer from the area where they were found, Vivek Gogia, told a press conference computer logs showed the police were on the scene six minutes after receiving a distress call and the couple were in hospital 28 minutes later.
“This is not the time to engage in arguments,” he added.
Separately, the police filed a case against Zee News because the interview — which showed the boyfriend’s face unobscured — had illegally disclosed the identity of a rape victim.
The Committee to Protect Journalists criticized the move in a statement.
While faith in the police force is already low — they are widely pilloried as corrupt, insensitive to complaints from women and understaffed — the revelation that bystanders failed to help the injured couple angered some Delhi residents.
“As people we should try and improve ourselves because the boy talked about how the people who were passing by did not try to help them,” said Abhinav Agarwal, a 31-year-old manager at a private company.
“More than the police, it is the public who should try to reflect and bring a change in their attitude,” he told AFP.
Others pointed out that witnesses to crimes were generally reluctant to help or come forward in India out of fear of being implicated by police or being consumed in a lengthy trial.
At the district court hearing the case of the suspects in south New Delhi, magistrate Namrita Aggarwal told AFP that she had “taken cognizance of the case” during a hearing, meaning that the trial was now formally under way.
The suspects have been called to appear before her on Monday, she said.
Aggarwal had been expected to transfer the case to a separate fast-track court set up to try the case.
The raped woman was an ambitious physiotherapy student interning in New Delhi who had been to see the “Life of Pi” film at an upmarket shopping mall with her boyfriend.
“I was not very confident about getting into the bus but my friend was running late, so we got into it. This was the biggest mistake I made,” he said.
He told how the driver of the bus and his accomplices allegedly made lewd remarks before stopping the vehicle, which had tinted windows, and locking the doors.
“They hit me with a small stick and dragged my friend to a seat near the driver’s cabin,” he told AFP.
After that the “driver and the other men raped my friend and hit her in the worst possible ways in the most private parts of her body.”
“I cannot tell you what I feel when I think of it. I shiver in pain,” he said.
In his interview with AFP, he said he was “in love” with the victim but declined to comment on statements from friends that they were to marry.
The man’s father also spoke to AFP by telephone, saying his son was still in a state of shock but that he was proud he had done his best to defend the woman.
“It will take some time for him to heal mentally,” he said.
“He has started eating home food and is feeling much better after leaving Delhi. My son fought bravely. He tried until the very end to save the girl and I am proud of him.”
India rape victim's pal hits police incompetence, public apathy
India rape victim's pal hits police incompetence, public apathy
Fighting between armed sectarian groups in restive northwestern Pakistan kills at least 33 people
- Senior police officer said Saturday armed men torched shops, houses and government property overnight
The overnight violence was the latest to rock Kurram, a district in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, and comes days after a deadly gun ambush killed 42 people.
Shiite Muslims make up about 15 percent of the 240 million people in Sunni-majority Pakistan, which has a history of sectarian animosity between the communities.
Although the two groups generally live together peacefully, tensions remain, especially in Kurram.
The senior police officer said armed men in Bagan and Bacha Kot torched shops, houses and government property.
Intense gunfire was ongoing between the Alizai and Bagan tribes in the Lower Kurram area.
“Educational institutions in Kurram are closed due to the severe tension. Both sides are targeting each other with heavy and automatic weapons,” said the officer, who spoke anonymously because he was not authorized to speak to the media.
Videos shared with The Associated Press showed a market engulfed by fire and orange flames piercing the night sky. Gunfire can also be heard.
The location of Thursday’s attack was also targeted by armed men, who marched on the area.
Survivors of the gun ambush said assailants emerged from a vehicle and sprayed buses and cars with bullets. Nobody has claimed responsibility for the attack and police have not identified a motive.
Dozens of people from the district’s Sunni and Shiite communities have been killed since July, when a land dispute erupted in Kurram that later turned into general sectarian violence.
Key UN committee adopts resolution paving the way for a first-ever treaty on crimes against humanity
Key UN committee adopts resolution paving the way for a first-ever treaty on crimes against humanity
- The International Criminal Court was established to punish major perpetrators of war crimes
- ICC has 124 countries that are parties to it
UNITED NATIONS: A key UN General Assembly committee adopted a resolution late Friday paving the way for negotiations on a first-ever treaty on preventing and punishing crimes against humanity after Russia dropped amendments that would have derailed the effort.
The resolution was approved by consensus by the assembly’s legal committee, which includes all 193-member UN nations, after tense last-minute negotiations between its supporters and Russia that dragged through the day.
There was loud applause when the chairman of the committee gaveled the resolution’s approval. It is virtually certain to be adopted when the General Assembly puts it to a final vote on Dec. 4.
“Today’s agreement to start up negotiations on a much-needed international treaty is a historic achievement that was a long time coming,” Richard Dicker, Human Rights Watch’s senior legal adviser for advocacy, told The Associated Press.
“It sends a crucial message that impunity for the kinds of crimes inflicted on civilians in Ethiopia, Sudan, Ukraine, southern Israel, Gaza and Myanmar will not go unheeded,” he said.
The resolution calls for a time-bound process with preparatory sessions in 2026 and 2027, and three-week negotiating sessions in 2028 and 2029 to finalize a treaty on crimes against humanity.
Dicker said Russia’s proposed amendments left in question whether treaty negotiations would have been completed.
Russia’s deputy UN ambassador Maria Zabolotskaya said Russia withdrew the amendments “in a spirit of compromise.” But she said Russia “dissociates itself from consensus.”
“This, of course, does not mean that we are not ready to work on this crucial convention,” Zabolotskaya told the committee.
The International Criminal Court was established to punish major perpetrators of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide and it has 124 countries that are parties to it. The ICC says crimes against humanity are committed as part of a large-scale attack on civilians and it lists 15 forms including murder, rape, imprisonment, enforced disappearances, sexual slavery, torture and deportation.
But the ICC does not have jurisdiction over nearly 70 other countries.
There are global treaties that cover war crimes, genocide and torture — but there has been no specific treaty addressing crimes against humanity. And according to sponsors of the resolution, led by Mexico and Gambia and backed by 96 other countries, a new treaty will fill the gap.
Kelly Adams, legal adviser at the Global Justice Center, also called the resolution “a historic breakthrough” after many delays.
Pointing to “the proliferation of crimes against humanity around the world,” she expressed hope that a treaty will be “strong, progressive and survivor-centric.”
Amnesty International’s Secretary General Agnes Callamard expressed disappointment that the timeline had been extended until 2029, but said, “What’s important is that this process will deliver a viable convention.”
“It is long overdue and all the more welcome at a time when too many states are intent on wrecking international law and universal standards,” she said. “It is a clear sign that states are ready to reinforce the international justice framework and clamp down on safe havens from investigation and prosecution for perpetrators of these heinous crimes.”
After the resolution’s adoption, Gambia’s Counselor Amadou Jaiteh, who had introduced it hours earlier, called its approval “a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to make a difference,” to hope for a world without crimes against humanity, “and a world where voices of victims are heard louder than their perpetrators.”
Philippine VP made ‘active threat’ on Marcos’ life: palace
- The statement followed an expletive-laced press conference in which Duterte alleged she was the subject of an assassination plot
Manila: Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos’ security detail has been put on alert over what his office is calling an “active threat” against his life by Vice President Sara Duterte, the palace said Saturday.
The statement followed an expletive-laced press conference in which Duterte alleged she was the subject of an assassination plot and said she ordered a member of her security team to kill the president should it succeed.
The Duterte and Marcos families have seen their alliance unravel in spectacular fashion in recent months, trading accusations of drug addiction and increasingly extreme rhetoric ahead of next year’s mid-term elections and presidential polls in 2028.
“I already talked to a person in my security. I told him if I get killed, kill BBM (Ferdinand Marcos), (first lady) Liza Araneta and (the president’s cousin) Martin Romualdez. No joke,” Duterte said at a press conference that began after midnight.
“I said, if I die, don’t stop until you have killed them.”
Hours later, the palace communications office said it had referred “this active threat to the Presidential Security Command for immediate proper action.”
“Any threat to the life of the President must always be taken seriously, more so that this threat has been publicly revealed in clear and certain terms,” it said in a statement.
Duterte is facing the threat of impeachment in the House of Representatives, led by Marcos’s cousin Romualdez, who is widely expected to run for president in 2028.
She has also had a messy falling out with the president’s wife Liza Araneta-Marcos, who has accused her of laughing at a January event where her father, former president Rodrigo Duterte, accused Marcos of being a “drug addict.”
Duterte called her late-night press conference after House officials said they would transfer her chief of staff — detained after being cited for contempt — from the lower chamber’s detention center to a correctional facility.
Zuleika Lopez was detained on Wednesday after being accused of “undue interference” in House proceedings focused on Duterte’s spending of public funds.
Duterte stepped down from the cabinet post of education secretary in June as relations between the two families reached a breaking point.
Months earlier, her father had accused Marcos of being a “drug addict,” with the president the next day claiming his predecessor’s health was failing due to long-term use of the powerful opioid fentanyl.
Neither provided evidence of their allegations.
In October, Duterte said she felt “used” after teaming with Marcos for the May 2022 election, which they won by a landslide.
Duterte remains the constitutional successor to the 67-year-old president.
US restricts food, metal imports on Uyghur forced labor concerns
- Goods wholly or partially made by the sanctioned firms will be restricted from entering the US, says the Department of Homeland Security
- China is accused of incarcerating over 1 million Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in Xinjiang, although officials strongly deny this
WASHINGTON: The United States said Friday that it is barring imports from dozens more China-based companies — ranging from businesses in the metals to food industries — citing worries over forced labor.
Officials are adding around 30 entities to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act entity list, meaning that goods wholly or partially made by these firms will be restricted from entering the United States.
The new additions bring the total number on the list to 107, said the Department of Homeland Security.
The reason is that the companies were found to either source materials from China’s northwestern Xinjiang region or work with its local government “to recruit, transfer, and receive workers, including Uyghurs, out of Xinjiang,” said the US Trade Representative’s office.
Beijing has been accused of incarcerating over one million Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in a network of detention facilities in Xinjiang, although officials strongly deny this.
The newly-targeted companies make goods ranging from agricultural to aluminum products, along with polysilicon materials.
They also mine and process metals like copper, gold and nickel, the USTR statement added.
Among them are companies tied to Chinese electric vehicle battery manufacturer CATL and China-linked Gotion too, a bipartisan US congressional committee noted on Friday.
Earlier this year, the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party and others flagged CATL and Gotion’s ties to two businesses, Xinjiang Nonferrous and Xinjiang Joinworld.
Both were included in the latest update.
The committee’s chairman John Moolenaar and other lawmakers released a statement saying: “While we are pleased with this initial step, we remain concerned that CATL and Gotion’s supply chains are deeply tied to the Xinjiang region.”
The rule comes into effect on November 25.
“Companies should not secure unfair advantages by exploiting workers,” said US Trade Representative Katherine Tai.
“We will enforce our laws to address forced labor and prevent companies that violate workers’ rights from benefiting from the US market,” she added in a statement.
The Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act was signed into law in 2021.
Trump plans to assemble investigative teams to look into 2020 election, Washington Post reports
WASHINGTON: US President-elect Donald Trump plans to assemble investigative teams at the Department of Justice to search for evidence in battleground states that fraud tainted the 2020 election, the Washington Post reported on Friday, citing a source.
Trump, who won the 2024 election but lost the 2020 election to President Joe Biden, has falsely claimed that he lost the 2020 election due to extensive voter fraud, a view shared by millions of his supporters.
Trump was indicted last year on federal charges for his attempts to overturn the election. The charges stemmed from an investigation by Special Counsel Jack Smith.
The Washington Post, citing two people close to Trump’s transition team, reported that Trump plans to fire the entire team that worked with Smith.
