Death sentence and detentions raise profile of rape in Somalia

Nairobi (KON) - The recent execution in Somalia of a soldier convicted of rape and the detention of a journalist investigating sexual assault have given the traditionally taboo issue of gender-based violence an usual degree of prominence.

Editorial Keydmedia Online
25 January 2013

Even the president has weighed in. Speaking from Washington, DC, where he met with US President Barack Obama on 17 January, Hassan Sheikh Mohamud said that his government would not intervene in the case of the journalist, despite pressure from numerous organizations, including Human Rights Watch, and senior UN officials.

Mohamud said that freedom of the press "does not mean that tainting the image of the government is acceptable by any standards".

A Band-Aid

After an article published in December 2012 accused several state security officers of rape, police questioned journalists and one alleged victim. Since then, as many as five people have been detained - all of them as a result of their complaints or investigations and none on suspicion of having perpetrated rape.

Mohamud told Voice of America that incidents of rape by men in in uniform were on the decline in Somalia and that the problem there would soon come to an end. Commenting on the previous day