ABRACADABRA

Army can have women as payment: Sudan

Geneva : South Sudan lets fighters rape women as payment, the UN rights office said, describing the country as “one of the most horrendous human rights situations in the world.”

  “The assessment team received information that the armed militias… who carry out attacks together with the SPLA (South Sudanese army) commit violations under an agreement of ‘do what you can and take what you can,'” the rights office said in a new report.

“Most of the youth therefore also raided cattle, stole personal property, raped and abducted women and girls as a form of payment,” the report added.

In a report, the UN human rights office painted a harrowing picture of civilians suspected of supporting the opposition, including children, being burned alive, suffocated in shipping containers, hanged from trees and cut to pieces, reports AFP.

UN human rights chief Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein meanwhile warned that brutal rapes had been used systematically as “an instrument of terror and weapon of war.”   “This is one of the most horrendous human rights situations in the world,” he said in a statement.

After gaining independence from Sudan in 2011, South Sudan erupted into civil war in December 2013, setting off a cycle of retaliatory killings that have split the poverty-stricken, landlocked country along ethnic lines.

Men are bad in U.K

London :  An alarming 85 per cent of young women in Britain have been sexually harassed in public places with very few people stepping in to intervene, according to a survey released to mark the International Women’s Day.

  The YouGov survey, commissioned by the End Violence Against Women (EVAW) coalition, found that 85 per cent of women between 18 and 24 had been sexually harassed, with half of this age group said they had experienced unwanted sexual touching. Only 11 per cent reported that someone else had intervened on their behalf while being inappropriately touched, with eight in 10 saying they would have liked someone to have stepped into to help them.

  More than a quarter of women who had experienced sexual touching or harassment said they were under 16 years old when it first happened. Overall, the research found that 64 per cent of women of all ages had experienced harassment, with more than a third (35 per cent) experiencing inappropriate touching. Sarah Green, acting director at the EVAW, said: “If women are planning their lives around not being harassed or assaulted, they are not free.

  “Women should be free to live their lives without the threat of harassment or violence, and not having to plan and limit their choices to make sure they are safe.”

   The survey also found that women supported more police (53 per cent), better street lighting (38 per cent), more transport staff (38 per cent), and public awareness campaigns encouraging others to intervene (35 per cent).    Later this month, EVAW will be launching a manifesto on ending violence against women and girls for the London mayoral candidates ahead of the city’s election in May. YouGov surveyed 1,650 adults in an online survey of which 889 were female and 106 were female aged 18-24, reports PTI.

Pilot threatens to crash jet to settle score with wife

An Italian pilot flying a Japan-bound flight allegedly threatened to crash the plane with 200 passengers on board if his wife left him, according to a media report.

The unnamed pilot, in his 40s, sent a text to his wife saying he would kill himself along with the 200 passengers on his Rome-Japan flight after she apparently threatened to leave, The Times reported on the incident that occurred in January last year.

Police managed to stop the pilot at Fiumicino airport in Rome from taking controls of the flight just minutes before take-off. His wife had alerted authorities after he sent her a text message threatening to commit suicide and kill everyone on board the long-haul flight from Rome, the report said.

Another pilot took his place and passengers were not told about the incident that has been kept secret until now, the report said. The Italian pilot sent the text message after his wife announced she was leaving him, and referred to the flight he was due to take that night.

Don’t chat with girls in school lest- you be suspended!

London : An Islamic school here in the UK is under investigation for suspending a teenager for conversing with a member of opposite sex on its premises, reports PTI.

 The pupil, whose identity and gender are not being disclosed for legal reasons, studied at Al-Khair secondary school in Croydon, south London.

The parent of the pupil has attacked the policy of the private Islamic school as “nonsense”, saying it meant students were not being prepared for life in British society.

“How are these kids going to integrate in the wider shape of society when they have to work in the same places that [people of the opposite sex] are working? This is totally nonsense,” the parent told ‘The Sunday Times’.

The UK Department for Education (DfE) launched an investigation into the incident amid concerns that the school’s policy may be in breach of the Equality Act or the independent schools standards that operate in fee-paying schools. These require schools to teach pupils to live by British values, including respect for the law, democracy and the right of women to be treated on a par with men.

The behaviour policy at Al-Khair secondary, which charges annual fees of 4,900 pounds per student, prohibits interaction “through any medium [eg: verbal, email, messaging, etc]” between male and female students who are considered “non-mahrams” (not close relatives).

While male and female students at the school are based in the same building, they are taught in separate classes.

Under a section of the policy outlining “high-level” offences that could lead to an exclusion, “free-mixing” is listed alongside “drug dealing, stealing, extortion, racism and arson”.

While schools inspectorate Ofsted reviewed the school’s behaviour policy during a snap inspection last September, the regulator failed to address the issue that relates to “free-mixing”, or interaction between male and female pupils.

A spokesperson for the DfE said: “We are clear that gender segregation of this type has no place in our schools and that boys and girls must be allowed to communicate.

“The secretary of state has asked Ofsted to urgently investigate this incident. If the school has breached its duties under the Equality Act or the independent school standards, we will not hesitate to take immediate action.”