I just don't know what to say...

[rs]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20071120/us_nm/saudi_rape_usa_dc_1;_ylt=AtDeQ7myqFAIfsF5a3xww4IE1vAI

Saudi defends verdict against gang-rape victim

1 hour, 30 minutes ago

RIYADH (Reuters) - Saudi Arabia defended on Tuesday a court's decision to sentence a woman who was gang-raped to 200 lashes of the whip, after the United States described the verdict as "astonishing."

The 19-year-old Shi'ite woman from the town of Qatif in the Eastern Province and an unrelated male companion were abducted and raped by seven men in 2006.

Ruling according to Saudi Arabia's strict reading of Islamic law, a court had originally sentenced the woman to 90 lashes and the rapists to jail terms of between 10 months and five years. It blamed the woman for being alone with an unrelated man.

Last week the Supreme Judicial Council increased the sentence to 200 lashes and six months in prison and ordered the rapists to serve between two and nine years in jail.

The ruling provoked rare criticism from the United States, which is trying to persuade Saudi Arabia to attend a Middle East peace conference in Annapolis, Maryland next week.

A State Department spokesman told reporters on Monday that "most (people) would find this relatively astonishing that something like this happens."

The court also took the unusual step of initiating disciplinary procedures against her lawyer, Abdul-Rahman al-Lahem, forcibly removing him from the case for having talked about it to the media.

"The Ministry of Justice welcomes constructive criticism ... The system allows appeals without resort to the media," said Tuesday's statement issued on the official news agency SPA.

It berated media for not specifying that three judges, not one, issued the recent ruling and reiterated that the "charges were proven" against the woman.

It also repeated the judges' attack against Lahem last week, saying he had "spoken insolently about the judicial system and challenged laws and regulations."

My god, I would certainly hope so... Remaining silent about this level of injustice is inconceivable.

Lahem was not available for comment.

New York-based Human Rights Watch has called on King Abdullah, who last month announced plans to overhaul the system, to drop all charges against the woman.

A series of erratic verdicts have focused attention on the Saudi legal system, which is dominated by clerics who adhere to the kingdom's austere Sunni form of Islamic law. Personal status law remains uncodified and the system does not recognize the concept of precedent.

(Reporting by Andrew Hammond; Editing by Caroline Drees)

 

[mkrnhr]

the law! (sigh)
guess the report is to influence politics and not to save that girl (and other humans from stupid laws and religions), otherwise, nobody would never heard about

 

[QueenVee]

In that society women are still considered the "property" of either their fathers or their husbands. A piece of property cannot be a victim. The only person who is "victimized" by what happened to the woman is the man who owns her, because the rape has now turned the woman into "damaged goods" that are now worthless in the marriage/reproductive marketplace. The woman must be punished because it was her behaviour (removing herself from the "safety" of her owner) that led to the damage. She must be held up as an "example" to other women who may be similarly tempted to place their owner's property at risk.

 

[dant]

Sorry to say this, but in SA and many countries, women are simply
chattel - to be used as property or slaves for psychopathic men who
wrote the laws for men. There is no equality for women. In this country
men are a "head" above women?

What if a woman is 'alone' shopping for groceries - and it so happens
that she was pulled into an alley to get raped, according to the literal
interpretation of the law: "The woman was alone with an unrelated man"
then she deserves what she got PLUS LASHES FOR VIOLATING IT!

What Nonsense! What rubbish! It is obviously stupid, senseless,
pathocratic law. Well for one thing, we know there are psychopaths
that have no conscience and at least the reading of the law tells us
that much about their society and their laws! The only problem perhaps
is that the laws are not always public knowledge, perhaps, and if this be
the case, maybe they can create laws, "on the fly", as it unfolds?

Isn't this what we call, setting a precedent? Gah!

We have such senseless and subjective laws everywhere on the BBM so
no country is without it's psychopathic flaws. OSIT.

 

[Ruth]

In that society women are still considered the "property" of either their fathers or their husbands. A piece of property cannot be a victim. The only person who is "victimized" by what happened to the woman is the man who owns her, because the rape has now turned the woman into "damaged goods" that are now worthless in the marriage/reproductive marketplace. The woman must be punished because it was her behaviour (removing herself from the "safety" of her owner) that led to the damage. She must be held up as an "example" to other women who may be similarly tempted to place their owner's property at risk.

Good Lord! They are all as insane as the pathetic laws that they use to enslave people!

 

[PopHistorian]

We shouldn't forget that the US president was asked to condemn this and would not. His spokesperson refused any further comment. CNN quoted H. Clinton:

"The Bush administration has refused to condemn the sentence and said it will not protest an internal Saudi decision," the Democrat presidential front-runner said in a statement. "I urge President Bush to call on King Abdullah [of Saudi Arabia] to cancel the ruling and drop all charges against this woman."

Well, at least he's decided not to meddle in the affairs of another government, for once. On the other hand, he's failing to promote "freedom and democracy around the world" if he doesn't include his good buddies, the overtly totalitarian Saudis, who don't even write down their Sharia-based laws, I hear -- they just spring 'em on you when they want to.

Maybe Bush is thinking, "aw heck, they say them whip lashes ain't so bad as they could be 'coz it says right here in Wikipedia, 'The person administering the lashes is required to keep a Qur'an under the armpit of the arm with which he delivers the blows so as to limit the force of the strike.'" (_http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_in_Saudi_Arabia) Gee, if only US soldiers were required to juggle a Bible while they're shooting...