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The recent brutal gang-rape of a 23-year-old girl in a moving bus in Delhi, India, resulted in expressions of outrage and anger everywhere in the country. The weeks after the rape saw an unprecedented focus on sexual assault—in formal and informal conversations, protests, television debates, drawing rooms, social media, and official statements. These protests were unique because they brought everyone to the streets. It is heart warming that many of the conversations spurred by this response are affirmative—they discuss women’s right to wear what they want, to walk the streets after dark, and other such issues. And, they take on political and spiritual leaders who blame women for rape in direct and indirect ways.

BEFORE the recent French intervention in Mali began, 412,000 people had already left their homes in the country’s north, fleeing torture, summary executions, recruitment of child soldiers and sexual violence against women at the hands of fundamentalist militants. Late last year, in Algeria and southern Mali, I interviewed dozens of Malians from the north, including many who had recently fled. Their testimonies confirmed the horrors that radical Islamists, self-proclaimed warriors of God, have inflicted on their communities.

According to the news received from Saudi Arabia Rizana Nafeek, who has been the Dawadami Prison since 2005 may be executed at any moment. This was revealed to the BBC Sinhala Service by Dr. Kifaya Iftekhar, who is based in Saudi Arabia and who has been looking after the interests of Rizana for several years now. Dr. Iftekhar also said that the Sri Lankan government has been informed by the Saudi authorities of the possibility of her impending execution.

Last month's brutal gang rape of a young woman in the Indian capital, Delhi, has caught public attention and caused worldwide outrage. But here, the BBC's Geeta Pandey in Delhi recalls other prominent cases which made the headlines, then faded from public memory.