Bangladesh anti-rape protests reach global media

As protests over the recent spike in rapes --- done both individually and in groups --- sparked across the country making headlines for the past few days, international media, too, has been covering the issue.

A number of frontline global news outlets, including AFP and Al Jazeera, have published stories over the period. 

In fact, Al Jazeera ran the report headlined “Bangladesh rocked by fresh protests over sexual assaults” which was actually published by AFP first on Tuesday.

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The same day, India’s state-run DD News Agency published a story titled “Bangladesh: Protests erupt against rape in Noakhali.” Moreover, some other news outlets in the neighbouring country touched upon the anti-rape protests in Bangladesh. 

Agencia EFE, a Spanish international news agency, too, joined the coverage with a report having the headline “Anti-rape protests grip Bangladesh after woman was molested” on Wednesday.

BenarNews, a news agency funded by the US Agency for Global Media (USAGM), too, ran a report “Viral Video Sparks Protests in Bangladesh Against Rape, Sexual Violence” the same day. 

BBC Bangla, also, had a report on Wednesday in this regard. 

South Asian Monitor and Qantara.de, a website run by Germany’s international broadcaster Deutsche Welle, ran reports on Wednesday as well.

“Bangladesh under fire over rape menace” is the news report title published by Union of Catholic Asian News on Thursday, when Turkish-based Anadolu Agency, too, ran a piece.

Meanwhile, a YouTube channel called Project Nightfall with no fewer than 4,899,338 followers uploaded a video on Thursday highlighting the protests. 

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Waves of anti-rape demonstrations have entered the fourth day on Thursday across Bangladesh. 

The development comes after a video footage of five men gang-raping a housewife, stripping her naked and filming the video of the incident in Begumganj upazila of Noakhali, went viral on social media on Sunday.

The incident occurred in Joykrishnapur village under Eklashpur union of the upazila on September 2.

Amnesty International on Tuesday said Bangladeshi authorities must ensure justice to the victim.

Issuing a statement on Wednesday, the United Nations (UN) expressed serious concerns over the increasing violence against women in Bangladesh. 

Terming these heinous crimes and grave violations of human rights, it said: “One rape is one too many.”