90 Minutes from Arrest to Flogging

(Khartoum, Sudan) Over a period of merely 90 minutes, a 16-year-old Christian girl, Silva Kashif, was arrested, tried, convicted, sentenced and flogged under sharia law for wearing a skirt too short. She received 50 lashes for the crime of offending public morality.

Kashif, a high-school student, said she was heading to the local market in a Khartoum suburb to buy vegetables when she noticed a man following her. When she confronted him, she said he grabbed her by the hand and led her to a police station, where he charged her with wearing indecent clothes.

Kashif said she was lashed on her back, hands and legs.

"I came home and slept for a whole day. When my family found out, we all cried," she said.

Al-Haj, the human rights lawyer, said his group will protest that authorities gave Kashif the maximum sentence and ignored that she was a minor and a Christian.

"The whole thing from her arrest to her flogging didn't take one hour and half. This is unprecedented," he said. "We want to question the police officers and the judge, to exonerate Silva and to campaign against these laws."

According to women's rights activist Amal Habbani, the quick trials and sentences result in women not speaking about their experiences. It's a "repression of a whole society through its women," she said.

In my estimation, this incident argues against multiculturalism and diversity. Some cultural norms should not be tolerated.

Companion post at The Jawa Report.