Criminal investigation launched into paedophile ring involving UK politicians in the 1980s, India's New Focus on Rape Shows Only the Surface of Women's Perils

Criminal investigation launched into paedophile ring involving UK politicians in the 1980s
Police launch criminal investigation into MPs’ child sex ring
Martin Hickman Author Biography
Thursday 17 January 2013

Scotland Yard tonight launched a full investigation into allegations that Conservative politicians were members of a paedophile ring which abused children in care the 1980s.

Operation Fernbridge will centre on the alleged historic sexual abuse of children at Elm Guest House, in Rocks Lane, a suburban street in Barnes, south-west London.

Residents of a nearby care home run by Richmond Council claim they were sexually assaulted at the property by a network of prominent individuals, including Tory MPs, who used their connections to escape justice....

Saying that the file contained “clear intelligence of a widespread paedophile ring”, Mr Watson said at Prime Minister’s Questions: “One of its members boasts of a link to a senior aide of a former Prime Minister, who says he could smuggle indecent images of children from abroad....

In a short statement, Scotland Yard said: “The Metropolitan Police Service have today, Thursday 17 January, launched an investigation, Operation Fernbridge, into historic allegations of child abuse in the early 1980s at the Elm Guest House, Rocks Lane, Barnes, London.

“The investigation will be led by the Child Abuse Investigation Command.”

The statement went on: “The allegations under Operation Fernbridge were initially assessed under Operation Fairbank which was information passed to police by MP Tom Watson. Operation Fernbridge reached the threshold for a criminal investigation.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/police-launch-criminal-investigation-into-mps-child-sex-ring-8456434.html


India's New Focus on Rape Shows Only the Surface of Women's Perils
January 13, 2013
By GARDINER HARRIS / The New York Times

NEW DELHI -- Harassed for years by her husband and his relatives, an Indian woman was finally kidnapped, raped, strangled and tossed into a ditch.

For more than a year, the woman's father has tried without success to get the police to arrest those accused of killing her, including her husband, who were charged but remain at large. The father, Subedar Akhileshar Kumar Singh, an army officer, says he believes his daughter was killed because her in-laws were not satisfied with her dowry, according to an article on Thursday in The Indian Express.

Such crimes are routine in this country, where researchers estimate that anywhere from 25,000 to 100,000 women a year are killed over dowry disputes. Many are burned alive in a particularly grisly form of retribution.

While a horrific gang rape in New Delhi has transfixed India and drawn attention to a violent epidemic, rape is just one facet of a broad range of violence and discrimination that leads to the deaths of almost two million women a year, researchers say. Among the causes are not only sexual violence but also domestic violence, family disputes and female infanticide, as well as infant neglect and poor care of the elderly that affect girls and women far more than boys and men....
http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/news/world/indias-new-focus-on-rape-shows-only-the-surface-of-womens-perils-670266/