Mayorkas responds to ‘SNL’ sketch that mocked WH defense of Biden’s age by continuing running trend
Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas responded to a “Saturday Night Live” sketch that used him to poke fun at President Biden’s age on Sunday. “SNL” depicted Mayorkas interviewing with CNN’s Dana Bash, an interview that ended up taking place in reality on Sunday morning on CNN’s “State of the Union.” On the show, the actor depicting Mayorkas rejected claims that Biden was moving slowly at the border during his visit last week, saying he saw the president carry out superhuman feats of agility and strength. “Behind closed doors, he’s a dynamo,” the faux-Mayorkas said. “He went into beast mode. He said, ‘We gotta tighten this border. Look how easy I can cross it.’ Then he parkoured up to the top of the border wall. He front-flipped into the Rio Grande and came back up with a fish in his mouth.” WHITE HOUSE CALLS FOR SANCTUARY CITIES TO COOPERATE WITH ICE AMID FUROR OVER ILLEGAL IMMIGRANT CRIMES Bash asked Mayorkas about the sketch Sunday morning, asking, “Does that happen every day?” SALVADORAN ILLEGAL IMMIGRANT ARRESTED IN CONNECTION TO MARYLAND MURDER OF 2-YEAR-OLD BOY “We all need a little comic relief now and then. I thought George Clooney did a terrific job,” Mayorkas said, cracking a joke of his own. In reality, Marcello Hernández played Mayorkas. Bash noted that the joke has a kernel of truth, in that a number of Americans are concerned about Biden’s age, while administration officials tend to point to supposed examples of the president’s vitality not seen by the public. Mayorkas continued this trend in response to Bash. “They should spend a bit of time with Joe Biden like I have done,” he responded before offering an anecdote. “I prepare a lot for meetings with him and engagements with him because he’s remarkably detail-oriented, probing and operationally focused.” “But no fishing in the Rio Grande?” Bash asked. “Not for me,” Mayorkas said. Biden visited the U.S.-Mexico border in Brownsville, Texas, last week, holding a competing event with former President Trump, who visited the much more heavily trafficked Eagle Pass, Texas. Data from U.S. Customs and Border Protection shows that Brownsville has seen just 46 migrant encounters over the past five days, compared to 2,106 in Eagle Pass. The former averaged 17 migrant encounters per day in February, while the latter averaged 462.
‘Go, win, wiill see you…’: PM Modi’s message to ministers at Viksit Bharat 2047 meet ahead of Lok Sabha elections 2024
In the meeting, he gave simple message for them ahead of the upcoming Lok Sabha elections: “Go, win. I will see you soon”. As per sources, PM Modi asked ministers to be careful while meeting people, “especially during elections”.
Kentucky Dem suggests child sex dolls could protect kids from pedophiles: ‘Gives them a release’
A Kentucky Democrat suggested sex dolls styled to resemble children could help prevent pedophiles from abusing kids, sparking condemnation and outrage from Republicans in the state. “This might be the most disturbing thing you see today. Watch KY Democratic Senator Karen Berg propose Child Sex Dolls for Pedophiles. This type of disturbing proposition has no place in the Commonwealth,” the Republican Party of Kentucky posted Friday with video of her comments. The post was in response to Democratic state Sen. Karen Berg saying in a committee hearing on Thursday that “minor-attracted persons” could benefit from sex dolls that look like children, arguing the dolls could give pedophiles a “release” that might prevent them from abusing kids. “There are what they call ‘MAPS,’ Minor Attracted Persons, and the limited amount of research that’s done on these dolls, guys, suggest that they actually – for people who are attracted to minors – that these dolls actually decrease their proclivity to go out and attack children,” Berg said, according to video of the hearing. “That it actually gives them a release that makes them less likely to go outside of their home.” CALIFORNIA RELEASES THOUSANDS OF PEDOPHILES LESS THAN YEAR AFTER THEIR CONVICTIONS, DATA SHOWS Kentucky lawmakers were discussing a bill, HB 207, which would make it a felony to be in possession of a sex doll that is styled like a child, as well as making trafficking, importing or promoting child sex dolls a felony, the Courier Journal reported. The bill would also include AI-generated photos of children in the state’s law against viewing and promoting sexual images of minors. PEDOPHILES ON DARK WEB TURNING TO AI PROGRAM TO GENERATE SEXUAL ABUSE CONTENT Berg argued that she had Googled child sex dolls the night prior to the committee meeting, as she was “completely unfamiliar” with such dolls, and found research indicating they could be helpful with pedophiles’ “proclivities.” CIVILIAN TARGETS SUSPECTED PEDOPHILES IN DOZENS OF UNDERCOVER STINGS “What was interesting, is the research did not support the same conclusions for people who were adult-attracted using dolls,” she said. Social media commenters and critics have since lambasted the state senator for her “disturbing” comments. “Why has Andy Beshear not yet condemned remarks by a Democrat suggesting child sex dolls have a place in our society? Are those views part of his Team Kentucky?” the Republican Party of Kentucky said in a post on X last week. “He ought to take a strong stance against such rhetoric to safeguard Kentucky’s children.” INSTAGRAM ALGORITHM BOOSTS ‘VAST PEDOPHILE NETWORK,’ BOMBSHELL REPORT CLAIMS “The right thing to do would be to immediately remove her from the building and from office,” Indiana attorney Aleks Djuricic posted on X. “The fact that Senator Berg tried to normalize pedophiles by calling them ‘minor attracted person’ says it all. Hey @karenforky, your sick child sex dolls won’t protect children from rape, only prison will do that,” Kelley Paul, author and wife of Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, tweeted Saturday of Berg’s comments. TRUSTEE OF TRANSGENDER KIDS’ CHARITY RESIGNS AFTER UNEARTHED SPEECH TO GROUP FOR ‘MINOR-ATTRACTED PERSONS’ Following the backlash, Berg released a statement saying she voted in favor of outlawing child sex dolls and that she “regrets” if her comments Thursday conveyed she supported pedophilia. OLD DOMINION UNIVERSITY PLACES PROFESSOR ON LEAVE AFTER INTERVIEW DEFENDING ‘MINOR-ATTRACTED PERSONS’ “As a mom and a physician, I am of course deeply concerned with the harm of pedophilia and I regret if my question in committee didn’t convey that. I voted in favor of House Bill (HB) 207 to outlaw child-sex dolls, a stance that aligns with my commitment to safeguarding the well-being of our youth and holding perpetrators accountable.” Fox News Digital reached out to Berg’s office and Beshear’s office Sunday for comment on the matter, but did not immediately receive replies.
Haley questions whether Trump will follow Constitution, backtracks on pledge to support GOP nominee
Former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley questioned whether former President Donald Trump would follow the Constitution if elected again and refused to say whether she would support him in the general election. “I don’t know,” Haley said during an appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press” Sunday, where she was asked if she believed Trump would follow the Constitution if elected. “When you go and you talk about revenge. When you go and you talk about, you know, vindication.… I don’t know what that means and only he can answer for that.” Haley, who is the only remaining contender in the GOP primary field facing off with Trump, has so far failed to gain traction among voters. Trump has easily swept every race of the primary season so far and currently holds 10 times the number of delegates as Haley, who has vowed to stay in the race. ILLINOIS JUDGE REMOVES TRUMP FROM STATE BALLOT, CITING “INSURRECTIONIST BAN” That vow came despite Haley losing her home state of South Carolina last month, with the candidate instead looking ahead to “Super Tuesday” on March 5 and the over 800 delegates up for grabs on the primary season’s most important day. Washington, D.C.’s GOP primary, which is held over three days this weekend, is also seen as a potential pickup for Haley, with Trump having come in a distant third in the district the last time he ran contested in the 2016 primary. BIDEN BORDER VISIT UNDERSCORES KAMALA HARRIS’ SHRINKING ROLE IN HANDLING MIGRANT CRISIS With Trump’s status as the clear frontrunner in seemingly little danger, Haley was pressed on whether she planned to support the former president if he secures the GOP nomination, something the former South Carolina governor refused to commit to despite an earlier pledge. “If you talk about an endorsement, you’re talking about a loss. I don’t think like that. When you’re in a race, you don’t think about losing,” Haley said when asked if she felt bound by an RNC pledge to support the eventual nominee. “What I can tell you is I don’t think Donald Trump or Joe Biden should be president. I don’t think we need two candidates in their 80s… I think people want a new generational leader that is going to go back to what the American dream is, what we want for our kids, and a place that’s something that we can be proud of again.” Pressed further on her former pledge, Haley argued that she will “make what decision I want to make” when it comes to endorsing the former president. “I don’t look at what ifs,” Haley said. “I look at how do we continue the conversation.”
The two-faced cookie that called out a lying politician in South Africa
Stopping at the Wembley Bakery in Belgravia – a Cape Town suburb designated for “Coloured” people only during apartheid – is best done on an empty stomach. It means you can really tuck into the seemingly endless rows of freshly baked cakes, tarts, cookies and doughnuts. Many of the confections will be familiar to international visitors: red velvet cupcakes, jam swiss rolls and custard doughnuts. But others can only be found in certain parts of Cape Town: fragrant “koesisters” dusted with desiccated coconut, meringue-topped “Hertzoggies” and garish pink-and-brown “tweegevrietjies”. Meringue-topped Hertzoggies and pink-and-brown tweegevrietjies at the Wembley Bakery in Belgravia.[Desmond Louw, DNA Photographers/Al Jazeera] Unlike the man it is named after – the Afrikaner nationalist JBM Hertzog, who first came to power a century ago – the Hertzoggie is a bite-sized delight. A crisp biscuit shell is filled with chunky apricot jam and topped with delicately spiced coconut meringue before being popped in the oven for a final singe. The cookie was invented by Hertzog’s white, female supporters in the 1920s, and continued to be baked at National Party – the party that would go on to implement apartheid in 1948 – events for decades to follow. But the Hertzoggie would also find favour among a different segment of the population. “Hertzog made two promises,” explains chef Cass Abrahams, a legendary Muslim cookbook author and radio personality who was responsible for bringing the centuries-old cuisine of her people to a wider audience from the 1970s onwards. “He said that he would give the women the vote, and hy sal die slawe dieselfde as die wittes maak (he would make the slaves equal to the whites).” Her choice of words is not accidental: Almost two centuries after the abolition of slavery, Abrahams and the Cape Malay (the descendents of enslaved Muslims from Indonesia and elsewhere) community have not forgotten their history of bondage. “Cape Malay women became terribly excited by Hertzog’s promises,” Abrahams continues. “So, they baked their own, spicier version of the Hertzoggie … for a while.” After the events of 1930, when Hertzog broke the second of his promises, by leaving women of colour disenfranchised, Coloured women returned to their ovens to bake a sarcastic version of the Hertzoggie: the crudely iced and sickly sweet pink-and-brown tweegevrietjie, or two-faced cookie, which lacks the delicacy and refinement of the original – deliberately so. “Women would bake them both and put them next to one another and tell their children the story of General Hertzog,” says Abahams. Both versions are still baked today, a familiar sight at Cape Malay teas, weddings and funerals – and “especially at Eid”, Abrahams adds. The Wembley Bakery sells about 1,500 classic Hertzoggies and 800 tweegevrietjies in an average week. Hertzoggies are crisp biscuit shells filled with chunky apricot jam and topped with delicately spiced coconut meringue [Desmond Louw, DNA Photographers/Al Jazeera] Recipe for disaster In the 1920s, South African politics was all about the so-called “native question” – that is, coming up with a workable solution to the inconvenient and incontrovertible truth for the white minority, that people of colour far outnumbered those with white skin. The Union of South Africa had only been established in 1910 – the Anglo-Boer War only concluded in 1902, and thanks to a hastily agreed hodgepodge constitution, different provinces had different voting rules. Men of all races could vote in the Cape Province (providing they met the property and literacy franchise qualifications), but only white males could vote in the three other provinces: Transvaal, Natal and Orange Free State. Prime Minister Jan Smuts declined to tackle the “native question”, preferring, as his biographer Richard Steyn puts it, “to kick the can down the road” in the hopes that the question would answer itself. Smuts’s bitter rival Hertzog, on the other hand, had very clear ideas about how to solve the “native question” – and segregation and disenfranchisement were at the heart of these ideas. From 1919 onwards, Hertzog, as leader of the opposition, made a concerted effort to win the Coloured vote. His “new deal for Coloureds” was simple, wrote Gavin Lewis in his seminal history of Coloured politics in South Africa: “In return for their support of [Hertzog’s] policies, Coloureds would share in the privileges legislated for white workers, and would be exempted from the restrictions applied to Africans.” Thanks in part to this promise, Hertzog – in coalition with the largely English-speaking, but equally racist, Labour Party – was able to topple Smuts at the 1924 election. As an aside, Jan Smuts also had a cookie named after him, a jam-filled pastry shell that is very similar to a British “maid of honour”. Peter Veldsman, one of South Africa’s leading culinary historians, explains, “The Jan Smutsies were an out-and-out political reaction from Smuts’s supporters: ‘They’ve got a cookie and we need one, too,’” before adding: “Personally, I prefer Jan Smuts cookies. And not just because my family were Smuts supporters. But I haven’t seen, let alone eaten, one for years.” JBM Hertzogg and Jan Smuts in front of Parliament in 1938 [Wikipedia] One step forward and three steps backward At the same time, the women’s suffrage movement was belatedly gathering steam in South Africa. While most Western nations granted women the right to vote in the years immediately following World War I, South Africa was slower on the uptake. Its parliament, after all, included men such as TC Visser, who claimed that “it was a scientific fact that the development of a woman’s brain stopped at a stage beyond which a man’s brain went on.” By the end of the 1920s, however, attitudes had changed and men like Visser were in the minority. Even Hertzog accepted that women should be allowed to vote. And when he announced plans to give both white and Coloured women the vote in the Cape – to “make the slaves equal to the whites” – Hertzoggies began to fly out of Cape Malay ovens. This enthusiasm ignored the fact that Hertzog
President Biden, why do you support genocide in Gaza?
Dear President Biden, I am writing to you for the second time. I first wrote to you on November 4 after 47 members of my community, including 36 from my own family, were murdered in a single attack by the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF). The massacre occurred in Khan Younis refugee camp, located in the southern region of the Gaza Strip, where people were supposed to be safe, as claimed by your ally, Israel. I am uncertain if my first letter reached you or if your media team made you aware of its contents. Either way, you have not changed your position. Your unequivocal support for Israel, including through large weapons transfers, means that many more such massacres have been committed with your help since then. Since writing that letter, I have lost another 220 members of my own family. Just a month ago, on January 31, my father’s cousin, Khaled Ammar, 40, who was displaced in Khan Younis, was killed alongside his entire family when the place they were staying in was shelled by an Israeli tank. Khaled’s wife, Majdoleen, 38, their four daughters, Malak, 17, Sarah, 16, Aya, 9, and Rafeef, 7, and their two sons, Osama, 14, and Anas, 2, all perished in the attack. Among the victims were also Khaled’s disabled brother Mohammed, 42, and their mother Fathiya, 60. Their bodies remained unburied for over a week. Khaled’s surviving brother, Bilal, 35, made repeated calls for assistance to the Palestinian Red Cross Society, but they could not dispatch a rescue team to look for survivors because the IOF did not grant them permission. Majdoleen and her two young daughters, Rafeef and Aya, came to see me last summer when I visited Gaza. I still remember Rafeef trying to ride the bike of my youngest niece, Rasha. I still remember them racing down the street, eating the candy they had bought from the shop of my cousin, Asaad. Their laughter still echoes in my ears. But today, Mr President, there is no Aya, no Rafeef, no Asaad, who was also killed by the IOF along with his wife, children, mom, two sisters, sister-in-law and their children. There are no roads, no homes, no shops, no laughter. Only echoes of devastation and the deafening silence of loss. Today, the residential area of Khan Younis refugee camp I grew up in is reduced to rubble. Tens of thousands of refugees, including all surviving members of my extended family, are now displaced to al Mawasi and Rafah. They are living in tents. They are not faring well, Mr President. I have not heard from them in a while, as Israel has cut off communication. On February 10, my nephew, Aziz, 23, walked three kilometres despite the danger to reach the edge of Rafah to use the internet. He told me that death has passed by them many times but spared them for now. They are hungry, thirsty, and cold. There is no power, no sanitation, no medications, no communications, or any services available to them, despite the International Court of Justice ruling that Israel has to ensure the delivery of aid to Gaza. If people do survive the Israeli bombs, they may not survive wounds sustained in the Israeli bombardment and the explosion of communicable and non-communicable diseases. The health care system has collapsed under the Israeli onslaught. In February, the IOF laid a siege on Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, the second-largest in the Gaza Strip. There were 300 medical staff trapped in the hospital alongside 450 patients and about 10,000 internally displaced persons seeking refuge within or in the hospital’s vicinity. For days, the IOF would not let a rescue team from the World Health Organization (WHO) evacuate patients and staff or deliver much-needed food, medical supplies and fuel. Throughout this time, the medical staff demonstrated remarkable courage and dedication to their patients, trying to keep them alive in the face of the Israeli attacks. Dr Amira Al Assouli, who rushed under Israeli fire to aid one of the wounded in the hospital courtyard is one bright example. Countless people who sought shelter in the hospital premises were killed or wounded; some of these murders were recorded on camera. On February 13, the IOF sent a young man named Jamal Abu Al Ola, whom Israeli soldiers had detained and tortured, to the hospital to tell the Palestinians sheltering there to leave. Wearing a white PPE garment and with his hands bound, he delivered the message and then – as instructed – headed towards the gate of the hospital, but was shot dead. His execution was documented by a journalist at the hospital and released to the public. Will you order an investigation, Mr President? Will you demand that those responsible for the killing of Jamal and the many others at Nasser Hospital be punished or will you accept the IOF’s version of events again? On February 15, the IOF raided the hospital, expelling thousands of people amid heavy bombardment and forcibly disappearing hundreds – at least 70 of them medical workers. This continues a pattern started in Gaza City. When the IOF raided Al Shifa Hospital, it detained some of its staff, among them, Dr Mohammed Abu Salmiya, the hospital director, who remains in Israeli jail. The excuse then, as now, is that they were hunting for a Hamas command centre – a false narrative, you, Mr President, readily embraced. During the raid of Nasser Hospital, the cutting off of electricity and oxygen resulted in the deaths of at least eight patients. When a WHO team was finally allowed to enter the hospital, its staffers described it as “a place of death”. After the evacuation of hundreds of patients, some 25 medical staffers stayed behind to care for the remaining 120 patients in the hospital without a secured supply of food, water or medications. Among the regular patients of Nasser Hospital was my relative, Inshirah, who suffered from kidney failure and required dialysis every week. She lived in the Al Qararah area,
Flipkart poses direct challenge to Paytm, Amazon Pay, Google Pay, PhonePe as it launches….
Flipkart, which claims to have more than 50 crore registered users and 14 lakh sellers on its marketplace, aims to reduce dependence on third-party UPI apps such as Paytm, PhonePe, Google Pay, and Amazon Pay.
Biden admin accused of using taxpayer funds to help his own campaign with student voter registration scheme
An effort championed by the Biden administration to have the federal government pay college students to register voters ahead of the 2024 election could have serious legal ramifications if it’s being done to aid President Biden’s “own re-election efforts,” according to some legal experts. Vice President Kamala Harris announced an election initiative to boost voter turnout during a meeting with voting rights activists at the Eisenhower Executive Office Building this week. “We have been doing work to promote voter participation for students, and, for example, we have, under the federal work study program, now allowed students to get paid through federal work study to register people and to be nonpartisan poll workers,” Harris said Tuesday. “As we know, this is important for a number of reasons.” One reason for the effort, Harris said, is to “engage our young leaders” in the process and “activate them in terms of their ability to strengthen our community.” KAMALA HARRIS PRAISES ‘NONPARTISAN POLL WORKER,’ WHICH IMMEDIATELY BACKFIRES WHEN PEOPLE LEARN WHO HE IS Jason Snead, executive director of Honest Elections Project, told Fox News Digital the effort is being carried out by the Biden administration to “aid its own re-election efforts.” “The Biden administration is weaponizing the federal government to aid its own re-election efforts. Using tax dollars to pay overwhelmingly liberal college students to register and turn out voters is only the latest scandal,” Snead said. “With Executive Order 14019, President Biden turned the entire federal government into a get-out-the-vote operation, and agencies are collaborating with left-wing nonprofit groups to get the job done. “Using the levers of the federal government to aid an incumbent is an abuse of power and a threat to the democracy President Biden claims to cherish.” WASHINGTON POST EDITORIAL BOARD SAYS BIDEN SHOULD IGNORE LIBERAL ‘WISH LISTS,’ SECURE BORDER TO BEAT TRUMP Hans A. von Spakovsky is a senior legal fellow at the Heritage Foundation’s Meese Center for Legal and Judicial Studies who serves as manager of the think tank’s Election Law Reform Initiative. He told Fox News Digital the taxpayer-funded effort is an “outrageous abuse of power” by the Biden administration. “This is the unauthorized use of taxpayer funds to get out the vote for the Biden campaign and Democratic candidates,” he said. “It is a violation of the Hatch Act as well as the Anti-Deficiency Act. It is an outrageous abuse of power.” In a memo published Monday, the Department of Education clarified that federal work study funds could be used to support voter registration activities. “The Department is today clarifying that FWS funds may be used for employment by a Federal, State, local, or Tribal public agency for civic engagement work that is not associated with a particular interest or group,” the memo stated. Harris’ comments announcing the effort sparked backlash from some conservatives and Republican lawmakers on social media, including Tennessee Republican Sen. Bill Hagerty, who accused President Biden of supporting the move to “mobilize (his) voters” ahead of the 2024 presidential election. “Biden signed EO14019 ordering federal govt to use taxpayer $ to mobilize (his) voters. [Stephen Miller] has FOIAed details, and I’ve sought them in Congress, but Biden is hiding them. Sounds like the election-year plan is underway,” Hagerty wrote in a Tuesday evening post to X. In a statement to Fox, a spokesperson for Hagerty insisted the senator is “very concerned” the Biden administration is using government resources to “boost” its own re-election chances. “Sen. Hagerty is very concerned that the Biden Administration is using government resources to target Democrat voter groups and boost its re-election chances,” the spokesperson said. “The administration continues to hide these taxpayer-funded voter mobilization plans despite his multiple requests for basic transparency. “And now Vice President Harris says they are paying ‘nonpartisan poll workers’ — with her example being a left-wing partisan activist. If there’s nothing to hide, then the Biden administration should release the plans.” In social media post Tuesday morning, Harris applauded poll workers for their efforts ahead of the 2024 presidential election. However, her complimentary remarks quickly backfired. “Our democracy could not function without nonpartisan poll workers like Vasu and Rob whom I met in Georgia. President Biden and I thank you and we support you,” she wrote in a post on X, sharing a photo of her appearing to listen to Vasu Abhiraman. X’s Community Notes immediately tagged the tweet with additional context that readers “might want to know,” that the supposed nonpartisan poll worker Abhiraman was actually a liberal advocate who promotes the progressive movement. “The ‘nonpartisan poll worker’ on the left is Vasu Abhiraman, a staffer at the left-wing Alliance for Justice and formerly of ACLU Georgia,” said on Harris’ tweet. Fox News Digital contacted the Biden administration seeking a response to the abuse of power allegations. Get the latest updates from the 2024 campaign trail, exclusive interviews and more at our Fox News Digital election hub.
Will Biden reconsider his unconditional support for Israel?
Facing a rebellion in his party and starvation in Gaza, will the Biden administration consider a new approach to Israel? US policy on Israel “looks incoherent because it is incoherent,” argues Matt Duss, former adviser to Senator Bernie Sanders, and this is making the United States look “feckless and weak”. Duss tells host Steve Clemons that Israel is violating US law by using US-supplied weapons while preventing humanitarian aid. But President Joe Biden “has simply taken the tools of leverage off the table”. Duss, the executive vice president at the Center for International Policy, says there are still no indications that the Abandon Biden movement within the Democratic Party, nor Israel’s war crimes, will lead to a shift in course anytime soon. Adblock test (Why?)
Four arrested after Spanish blogger on India motorcycle tour gang-raped
The couple had set up a tent to pass the night in Jharkhand state’s Dumka as seven men attacked them. Indian authorities have arrested four people suspected of being part of a group that gangraped a Spanish tourist and assaulted her partner. The woman – whose identity was not revealed by the authorities – is a travel blogger with more than 200,000 followers on Instagram. She was travelling with her partner in the eastern Indian state of Jharkhand when the attack happened on Friday night. The couple had stopped their motorbikes and set up a tent to pass the night in the state’s Dumka district before a group of seven men attacked them. All the members of the group have been identified and the remaining suspects will be arrested “soon”, Jharkhand police chief Ajay Kumar Singh told The Indian Express newspaper. “They had beaten us and robbed us, although not many things [were taken] because what they wanted was to rape me,” the 28-year-old woman said in an Instagram post. In another post, her male partner said he was hit several times in the head with a helmet and that his “mouth is destroyed”. A patrol car rescued the duo late on Friday night after the assault and escorted them to a local hospital. The couple were touring South Asia and had concluded a trip to Sri Lanka before the Indian leg of their journey. Sexual violence targeting women is common in India, with women from minority tribal communities being particularly at risk. Taboos around speaking up about the crime and low conviction rates of suspects add to the problem. An average of nearly 90 rapes were reported in India every day, meaning one woman was raped every 18 minutes, in 2022, according to the National Crime Records Bureau, which recorded 31,516 rape cases that year. Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh states recorded the highest number of cases. Adblock test (Why?)