Defend femicide, get a cabinet position. From The Guardian [2], Nov. 12:
"Anti-women" cabinet riles Pakistan activists
Two notorious politicians accused of brutal attitudes towards women have been made cabinet ministers in Pakistan, causing outrage among human rights activists.Mir Hazar Khan Bijarani, charged with presiding over a "jirga" which gave away five young girls as a form of compensation, and Israrullah Zehri [3], who recently made international headlines after defending the burying alive of women in "honour-killing" cases, have been elevated to ministerships.
Last year the supreme court ordered the arrest of Oxford-educated Bijarani over the allegations, though he remained at liberty. He has now been made minister for education. Street protests and angry newspapers editorials met the induction of Bijarani and Zehri, who were brought in as part of a major expansion of the cabinet last week.
"It is a very clear message from the government that they don't care about these things," said Samar Minallah, a human rights campaigner who had brought the court case against Bijarani. "I think they deliberately chose these two people to be ministers to send that message."
See our last post on Pakistan [4].
