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Published 24 Feb, 2015 06:37pm

Three-year-old boy sexually assaulted in Bannu

PESHAWAR: A three-and-a-half-year-old boy from the Sokari Karim Khan area of Bannu District was sexually abused on Monday.

According to Naseebullah, the father of the victim *A, the boy went missing on Monday morning and returned home in a terrible state a few hours later.

The boy revealed that Sher Qayyum, a resident of the same area, had kidnapped him. Qayyum allegedly took the boy to his house in the same street and sexually assaulted him, Naseebullah quoted the boy a saying.

The boy was later medically examined in which it was confirmed that he has been sexually assaulted. Police have lodged a case against Qayyum and filed an FIR on the complaint of victim’s parents.

Rape is notoriously difficult to prosecute in Pakistan. In April 2011, the Supreme Court had upheld the acquittal of five men sentenced to death in Pakistan's most famous rape case, that of Mukhtar Mai.

Mai was gang raped in 2002 on the orders of a village council as punishment, after her brother, who was aged just 12 at the time, was accused of having illicit relations with a woman from a rival clan.

A local court had sentenced six men to death, but a higher court acquitted five of them in March 2005, and commuted the sentence for the main accused, Abdul Khaliq, to life imprisonment.

Take a look: Pakistan’s Hidden Shame: Documentary reveals horrors of pedophilia in K-P

Director Mohammed Naqvi,and British producer Jamie Doran's film Pakistan’s Hidden Shame depicts the shocking reality of sexual abuse faced by small boys in the Northern areas of Pakistan.

The documentary premiered on September 1 on Britain's Channel 4 and shows the "dark reality of a society living in denial."

Set mainly in Peshawar, the film shows homeless boys of different ages recalling their experiences of sexual exploitation.

In the documentary, the narrator introduces Pakistan as 'one of the most important Muslim populations, a democracy, a nuclear power and a supporter of the Western bloc.' But it soon reveals the silence and denial on one of the most taboo topics: pedophilia.

The documentary alleges that 9 out of 10 children in Peshawar have been victims of pedophilia. It also contains interviews with truck drivers who have committed such crimes.

Shockingly, one of the drivers admits, without any remorse, to having raped 11 or 12 boys.

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