Islamabad: A Pakistan-based American blogger has alleged that she was raped by Pakistan’s former interior minister Rehman Malik and accused ex-prime minister Yousaf Raza Gillani and another former minister of physically manhandling her in 2011.
Cynthia D Ritchie made the allegation against the three top leaders of the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) through a video clip posted on her Facebook page on Friday, and soon it went viral on social media.
“In 2011, I was raped by the former interior minister Rehman Malik. That’s right, I’ll say it again. I was raped by the then interior minister Rehman Malik,” she claimed.
She also said Gilani and former health minister Makhdoom Shahabuddin “physically manhandled” her while the ex-prime minister was staying at the President’s House in Islamabad.
Ritchie’s allegations have escalated the already bitter row between her and the Opposition party following her tweet on May 28 against slain PPP leader and former prime minister Benzair Bhutto, which was termed as derogatory by the party leaders who filed a complaint against her at the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA).
Ritchie’s comments came as a reaction to a tweet discussing the violent confrontation between model Uzma Khan and a woman, who accused the former of having a relationship with her husband of 13 years and used this allegation to justify her violent treatment of the model.
“This echoes stories of what BB used to do when her husband cheated. She’d have the guards rape the women. Why do women condone this rape culture? Why aren’t the men ever held accountable? Where is the justice system,” Ritchie said in the tweet. (PTI)
