Tough to pick out in a line up...
Female Islamic students wearing burqas have kidnapped an alleged brothel owner and held her prisoner at their seminary in the Pakistani capital, as part of an anti-vice drive in defiance of the military-dominated Government. Late on Tuesday a group of 30 female and 10 male Islamic students broke into the alleged brothel, which lies about five minutes' walk from the mosque in the centre of Islamabad, after the owner, known as Aunty Shamim, ignored their warning to close it.
One student, Seema Zubair, 20, said they were holding Aunty Shamim, her daughter, daughter-in-law and six-month-old granddaughter inside their Jamia Hafsa seminary. She said the four were not being maltreated and would be freed if they promised to close the brothel. "We are not authorised by the Government to arrest them, but we are authorised by our religion, because this [prostitution] is evil," she said.
On Wednesday authorities arrested two of the seminary's female teachers and two male students over the abductions, sparking angry protests by hundreds of stick-wielding seminary students outside the Lal Masjid mosque, where they worship. Abdul Rashid Ghazi, the vice-principal of the seminary, threatened holy war unless the arrested teachers were freed.
But once again, the authorities cave in the face of Muzzy demands and threats:
Tensions eased late on Wednesday when Mr Ghazi announced that the police would be freed after authorities had agreed to release the seminary teachers and male students.
This just in... Aunty Shamin is free! But she had to repent and grovel first.
Before her release, the alleged brothel owner read a statement confessing she had committed immoral acts. She later said it had been made under duress. Girls from the Jamia Hafsa madrassa say they have won a victory over liberals.
In a statement on her release, the woman, clad in a burqa, said she repented of her actions. "I apologise for my past wrongdoing and I promise in the name of God that in future I will live like a pious person," she said before reporters. But she refused to admit she had been running a brothel.
She still sounds like she is a real kick in the pants...
The Associated Press news agency reported that she had "threatened to become a Christian" over her treatment by the students. "I don't think Islam allows anyone to beat a woman and drag her through the streets like a dog," it quoted her as saying.
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