CBS News' Logan victim of 'brutal' Egypt attack

[Tank]

NEW YORK — CBS News says correspondent Lara Logan is recovering in a U.S. hospital from an attack while reporting on the tumultuous events in Cairo last Friday.

Logan was in the city's Tahrir Square after Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak stepped down when she and her team and their security were surrounded by a mob of more than 200 people, the network said in a statement on Tuesday.

Separated from her crew in the crush of the mob, she suffered what CBS called "a brutal and sustained sexual assault and beating."

CBS News' Logan victim of 'brutal' Egypt attack - Entertainment - Television - TODAYshow.com

 

[syrenn]

And this is where kalam and crew all jump up and say "muslims dont rape women, its against islam".


Good or the women and soldiers who rescued her.

 

[waltky]

Looks like they want the freedom to rape...

CBS News' Logan Recovering after 'Brutal' Attack
Tuesday, February 15, 2011 - CBS News correspondent Lara Logan was recovering in a U.S. hospital Tuesday from a sexual attack and beating she sustained while reporting on the tumultuous events in Cairo.

Logan was in the city's Tahrir Square on Friday after Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak stepped down when she, her team and their security "were surrounded by a dangerous element amidst the celebration," CBS said in a statement Tuesday. The network described a mob of more than 200 people "whipped into a frenzy."

Separated from her crew in the crush of the violent pack, she suffered what CBS called "a brutal and sustained sexual assault and beating." She was saved by a group of women and an estimated 20 Egyptian soldiers, the network said. The Associated Press does not name victims of a sexual assault unless the victim agrees to it. She reconnected with the CBS team and returned to the U.S. on Saturday.

The scene last Friday in Tahrir Square - ground zero of 18 days of protests that brought down Mubarak - was primarily one of celebration - people wept, jumped for joy, cheered and hugged one another. Some soldiers stationed at the square ran into the crowd, and the protesters lifted them onto their shoulders. Other troops stayed at their posts, watching in awe. There were fireworks, the sound of car horns and even some shots fired in the air.

The attack on Logan, CBS News' chief foreign affairs correspondent, is one of at least 140 others suffered by reporters covering the unrest in Egypt since Jan. 30, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists. An Egyptian reporter died from gunshot wounds he received during the protests. A week before Friday's attack, Logan was detained by the Egyptian military for a day, along with two CBS cameramen. They returned to the U.S. after their release, and Logan went back to Cairo shortly before Mubarak left.

Logan joined CBS News in 2002. She regularly reports for the "CBS Evening News" as well as "60 Minutes," where she has been a correspondent since 2006. She has reported widely from Iraq and Afghanistan, and other global trouble spots. CBS said it had no further comment on Logan's assault.

Source

See also:

Logan attack spotlights dangers journalists face
16 Feb.`11 - The attack on a CBS correspondent in Egypt covering the fall of President Hosni Mubarak highlights the dangers that journalists face every day as they cover breaking news stories in foreign countries, especially regions that restrict freedom of the press.

Lara Logan, 39, was beaten and sexually assaulted by a Cairo mob Friday in the frenzied aftermath of Mubarak's resignation after she was separated from her TV crew. She is among more than 140 journalists who have been attacked while covering Egypt's political upheaval, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists, an independent organization to promote press freedoms worldwide. Logan is an CPJ board member. Logan was released from a New York Hospital on Tuesday and is recovering at her home in Washington, D.C. She was rescued by a group of women and soldiers.

But like many other journalists covering Egypt, it was not Logan's first frightening encounter. Another time, her team had been stopped by soldiers and marched at gunpoint to their hotel. The following day her crew was detained again in Cairo and interrogated overnight. "Arrested, detained, and interrogated," Logan told The Politics blog of Esquire magazine. "Blindfolded, handcuffed, taken at gunpoint, our driver beaten." Logan said "they kept us in stress positions — they wouldn't let me put my head down. It was all through the night. We were pretty exhausted."

Other journalists have reported being harassed and even beaten while covering the story in Egypt. CNN's Anderson Cooper, CBS's Katie Couric and ABC's Christiane Amanpour all were threatened by pro-Mubarak demonstrators. Reporters and correspondents from USA TODAY have also reported dangerous encounters in Egypt. Reporter Oren Dorell and another journalist were heading to a Cairo hotel in a hired car after arriving at the Egyptian airport when they rounded a bend in the road and came upon a group of a couple dozen men armed with kitchen knives, sticks and swords who motioned for the car to stop.

A man demanded to see their identification and told the driver to open the trunk. They were frisked by a man who got into the car and ordered the driver to follow two men on a scooter, which turned off a bridge onto some side streets strewn with trash. The cab finally stopped in front of a bunch of older men in plain clothes sitting in front of what looked like a police station on the Nile. A short distance away stood a handful of soldiers in front of tanks or armored personnel carriers. The journalists got out of the car and after a brief conversation with an army officer, Dorell and his colleague were free to go.

Generally, protesters were happy to see journalists covering the uprising that began Jan. 25. But the mood in Cairo changed in early February after Vice President OmarSuleiman blamed "foreign influences" for the uprising, and the state-controlled media suggested foreign agents had infiltrated the protests to harm Egypt. Tahrir Square, where the protests began, became a battle zone between pro-government and anti-government Egyptians and foreign journalists began seeing signs of harassment on the street and from police who said they were acting to protect journalists.

MORE

 

[LibocalypseNow]

She deserved it. She a JOOOOOOOOOOOO. Well that's what the Racist Arabs are saying anyway. It's very sad. I'll pray for this poor woman.

 

[High_Gravity]

Sending a sexy blonde woman to a country with sexually repressed strange horney men is a bad idea. I will pray for her.

 

[waltky]

Sounds like they're jealous of her beauty...

Story of attack on CBS correspondent in Egypt getting uglier
Saturday 19th February, 2011 - The “brutal and sustained” sexual assault and beating of CBS senior correspondent Lara Logan by male demonstrators in Cairo – and the skewed reaction to it in some parts – is a story that is so ugly and discomfiting on so many levels that it’s hard to know where to start.

The reporting of it unleashed a disappointing slew of inappropriate “she asked for it” responses on Twitter, in blogs, and even in the mainstream media that would make anyone sit up and check their calendar. Is this really 2011? Ms. Logan, 39, was in effect blamed for WWB – working while blond – especially in a Muslim country. Countless irrelevant photos have circulated picturing her in low-cut evening attire – as if she were wearing cocktail dresses to Tahrir Square, instead of her usual working attire. One self-described “jerk,” Nir Rosen, a left-leaning journalist and fellow at New York University, was forced to resign Wednesday after tweeting: “Jesus Christ, at a moment when she is going to become a martyr and glorified, we should at least remember her role as a major war monger,” and following it up with a dismissive: “Look, she was probably groped like thousands of other women.”

And right-wing blogger Debbie Schlussel wrote: “So sad, too bad, Lara. No one told her to go there. She knew the risks. And she should have known what Islam is all about. Now she knows.” Both these towering cultural commentators, too widely quoted, should go back to the obscurity they so richly deserve. Let’s start with the facts as we know them. CBS, with apparent reluctance after rumours began to swirl, confirmed last Tuesday that on the night Tahrir Square was filled with celebrants after the ouster of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, Ms. Logan, 39, became separated from her crew and was sexually assaulted and beaten by a mob of men before being rescued by a group of Egyptian women and about 20 soldiers.

After flying back to the United States and being admitted to hospital, the experienced war-zone correspondent is recovering at home with her husband and two young children. Ms. Logan is not yet talking to the media, but is said to be in “good spirits.” Now the nuances. How exactly was she assaulted? Her own network said she suffered “serious internal injuries,” but declined to elaborate. Only if there are legal proceedings against any of the assailants, or if Ms. Logan decides to tell her story, will we know more. We do know that sexual groping is a serious problem in Egypt, highlighted in a 2008 report from the Egyptian Centre for Women’s Rights that stated 83 per cent of Egyptian women and 98 per cent of foreign visitors said they were sexually harassed, from groping to assault, “on a daily basis.” Most incidents go unreported to authorities.

We also know that female correspondents face particular danger, simply because they are women. The other night, I talked to a young female journalist who just got back from reporting in Egypt. She told me she was “really rattled” by Lara Logan’s story and the groping she herself experienced in Tahrir Square. At one point, she said, “I went ballistic and turned and just yelled at the men who had touched me.” So, does that mean female journalists should not be sent to countries where sexual harassment is prevalent and where men regard women as their personal property? Of course not.

More Story of attack on CBS correspondent in Egypt getting uglier

 

[waltky]

Some details of the attack...

Lara Logan Was Stripped, Punched, Slapped, Report Says
Feb 21, 2011 – New details have emerged in the "brutal and sustained sexual assault and beating" inflicted on CBS Chief Foreign Correspondent Lara Logan in Egypt's Tahrir Square the night President Hosni Mubarak stepped down from power.

During the Feb. 11 attack, Logan was stripped of her clothes, punched and slapped by the crowd, according to the Times of London (via the Daily Mail.) She was beaten with the poles demonstrators used to fly flags during the protests, and red marks on her body initially believed to be bite marks turned out to be the result of pinching. As she was being abused, the crowd of roughly 200 men chanted "Israeli" and "Jew," apparently believing her to be a spy. Egyptian state media had been reporting that Israeli spies were disguising themselves as television crews.

Finally, a group of women and approximately 20 guards rescued Logan, 39, from the mob and took her to the Four Seasons Hotel for medical treatment. She was flown out of Egypt hours later and taken to New York, where she spent five days in a hospital. She was released from the hospital on Wednesday to recover at her home in Washington, D.C., according to CBS.

"Lara is getting better daily. The psychological trauma is as bad as, if not worse than, the physical injuries," an unnamed friend of Logan's told The Times. "She might talk about it at some time in the future, but not now."

The attack on Logan has sparked a fierce online debate over whether the reporter should have been in Egypt at all. NYU professor and journalist Nir Rosen resigned his position after writing on Twitter that Logan is a "war monger" and was "probably groped like thousands of other women, which is still wrong, but if it was worse than [sic] I'm sorry."

Source

 

[waltky]

Karate for female foreign journalists...

Lara Logan Assault: Why Female Foreign Correspondents Need Self-Defense Skills
Mar 13, 2011 - How does a woman acquire the trademarked name "Dr. Ruthless"?

If you're Melissa Soalt, aka "Dr. Ruthless," you preach the gospel of low-down, dirty, eye-gouging, groin-crushing, go-for-the-throat self-defense tactics for women. You also take your 26 years of martial arts training -- Soalt is in the Black Belt Hall of Fame -- and combine it with your insights as a former psychotherapist. You come up with a potent message to women that constant fear is a crippler, and that you can learn how to fight like a warrior -- or a mad dog -- always keeping in mind that fleeing, if possible, is your best defense.

Recently, Soalt joined an online discussion at Politics Daily about the attack on CBS reporter Lara Logan in Egypt. Soalt questions why female foreign correspondents don't routinely get self-defense training. She sent us her thoughts, and we followed up later with a call to her home in Massachusetts. Why did Lara Logan's attack touch such a nerve?

Journalists tell stories the world might otherwise never hear. They also speak for people who sometimes cannot speak for themselves, usually out of fear. And sometimes the journalist, the storyteller, becomes the story. That was the case with Lara Logan. Her assault and beating in Cairo's Tahrir Square sent shock waves through the journalistic community. Not only because it was a rapacious attack by a mob of men, but upon returning home she was re-attacked by loutish commentators and keyboard cretins who took some twisted pleasure in castigating her as the ballsy blonde, the warmongering reporter with a "hotness factor." In other words: she had it coming. Wanted it.

They should choke on a chicken bone.

MORE

 

[Midnight Marauder]

Separated from her crew in the crush of the mob, she suffered what CBS called "a brutal and sustained sexual assault and beating."

I am Soooo sick of debunking this shit. But, one more time: It has been FACTUALLY PROVEN THAT CHARLIE SHEEN WAS NOWHERE NEAR THE VICINITY YOU DUMBASS BASTARDS!!!!!

 

[hipeter924]

Don't worry this is a 'peaceful protest', she wasn't wearing the right dress, clearly they wanted more cleavage.

 

[rhodescholar]

As heard on "The Howard Stern show" regarding this incident....

HOWARD: "Hey Robin...the only questions I have is 1) did she have an orgasm and enjoy it 2) was she anally or vaginally penetrated first..."

ROBIN: "Howard, you've sunk to a new low...I just wish as a lesbian, that I'd been somewhere in that crowd, getting free gropes...she IS kind of hot, you know..."

HOWARD: "I think I need to send you on some away missions, like overseas reporting junkets. I'll have you following around attractive female reporters like that, just in case things like this happen again - most likely in the mideast, where we'd most expect the native savages to act out like this. "

"But if you are successful, you'll need to make sure all aspects are caught on video for our viewing audience's pleasure...."

ROBIN: "I'll do my best, Howard..."

 

[hipeter924]

As heard on "The Howard Stern show" regarding this incident....

HOWARD: "Hey Robin...the only questions I have is 1) did she have an orgasm and enjoy it 2) was she anally or vaginally penetrated first..."

ROBIN: "Howard, you've sunk to a new low...I just wish as a lesbian, that I'd been somewhere in that crowd, getting free gropes...she IS kind of hot, you know..."

HOWARD: "I think I need to send you on some away missions, like overseas reporting junkets. I'll have you following around attractive female reporters like that, just in case things like this happen again - most likely in the mideast, where we'd most expect the native savages to act out like this. "

"But if you are successful, you'll need to make sure all aspects are caught on video for our viewing audience's pleasure...."

ROBIN: "I'll do my best, Howard..."

Yet they are reporting the situation in Egypt as quote 'a peaceful protest'.

 

[JBeukema]

The most disgusting thing about it is all of you who politicized it and used it as another reason to vent your own nastiness

 

[Ropey]

The most disgusting thing about it is all of you who politicized it and used it as another reason to vent your own nastiness

Coming from one of the greatest spewers of hate and diatribe on this forum, well I don't think many will find your crocodile tears very inspiring.

Not smooth at all. When you toot your own horn, you might wish to be certain that the tone is correct.

Yours is quite off key.

 

[xsited1]

She is the hottest African American I have ever seen.

 

[waltky]

Lara's back!...

Lara Logan Talks About Assault to '60 Minutes'
Apr 28, 2011 –-- CBS correspondent Lara Logan says she believed she was going to die while she was being sexually assaulted and beaten in Egypt's Tahrir Square.

Logan speaks out Sunday on CBS' "60 Minutes" about the assault, which happened while she was reporting on that country's political uprising. She was set upon by a mob of several hundred men.

She said in an interview with Scott Pelley that "there was no doubt in my mind that I was in the process of dying. I thought not only am I going to die, but it's going to be just a torturous death that's going to go on forever."

After being rescued, she returned to the United States and was treated in a hospital for four days.

Lara Logan Talks About Assault to '60 Minutes'

 

[Tank]

Cool, I'm sure she sees the world in a whole new way

 

[waltky]

A more thorough article...

CBS correspondent describes Egypt mob's assault
4/28/2011 - Lara Logan plans '60 Minutes' appearance to raise awareness of sexual violence

Lara Logan thought she was going to die in Tahrir Square when she was sexually assaulted by a mob on the night that Hosni Mubarak’s government fell in Cairo. Ms. Logan, a CBS News correspondent, was in the square preparing a report for "60 Minutes" on Feb. 11 when the celebratory mood suddenly turned threatening. She was ripped away from her producer and bodyguard by a group of men who tore at her clothes and groped and beat her body. “For an extended period of time, they raped me with their hands,” Ms. Logan said in an interview with The New York Times. She estimated that the attack lasted for about 40 minutes and involved 200 to 300 men.

Ms. Logan, who returned to work this month, is expected to speak at length about the assault on "60 Minutes" on Sunday night. Her experience in Cairo underscored the fact that female journalists often face a different kind of violence. While other forms of physical violence affecting journalists are widely covered — traumatic brain injury suffered by the ABC News anchor Bob Woodruff in Iraq in 2006 was a front-page story at that time — sexual threats against women are rarely talked about within journalistic circles or in the media. With sexual violence, “you only have your word,” Ms. Logan said in the interview. “The physical wounds heal. You don’t carry around the evidence the way you would if you had lost your leg or your arm in Afghanistan.”

Raising awareness

Little research has been conducted about the prevalence of sexual violence affecting journalists in conflict zones. But in the weeks following Ms. Logan’s assault, other women recounted being harassed and assaulted while working overseas, and groups like the Committee to Protect Journalists said they would revise their handbooks to better address sexual assault. Jeff Fager, the chairman of CBS News and the executive producer of “60 Minutes,” said that the forthcoming segment about the assault on Ms. Logan would raise awareness of the issue. “There’s a code of silence about it that I think is in Lara’s interest and in our interest to break,” he said.

Until now the only public comment about the assault came four days after it took place, when Ms. Logan was still in the hospital. She and Mr. Fager drafted a short statement that she had “suffered a brutal and sustained sexual assault and beating.” That statement, Ms. Logan said, “didn’t leave me to carry the burden alone, like my dirty little secret, something that I had to be ashamed of.”

When 'everything went wrong'

 

[waltky]

Now we know where they got the idea, maybe it might lead to who did it...

Egyptian general admits 'virginity checks' conducted on protesters
May 30, 2011 - 17 women were arrested at a March 9 protest in Cairo, after Mubarak's ouster; A senior Egyptian general says some of them were subject to "virginity checks"; He says it was done so that they wouldn't claim later they had been raped; One woman allegedly targeted had said, "They wanted to teach us a lesson"

A senior Egyptian general admits that "virginity checks" were performed on women arrested at a demonstration this spring, the first such admission after previous denials by military authorities. The allegations arose in an Amnesty International report, published weeks after the March 9 protest. It claimed female demonstrators were beaten, given electric shocks, strip-searched, threatened with prostitution charges and forced to submit to virginity checks. At that time, Maj. Amr Imam said 17 women had been arrested but denied allegations of torture or "virginity tests."

But now a senior general who asked not to be identified said the virginity tests were conducted and defended the practice. "The girls who were detained were not like your daughter or mine," the general said. "These were girls who had camped out in tents with male protesters in Tahrir Square, and we found in the tents Molotov cocktails and (drugs)." The general said the virginity checks were done so that the women wouldn't later claim they had been raped by Egyptian authorities. "We didn't want them to say we had sexually assaulted or raped them, so we wanted to prove that they weren't virgins in the first place," the general said. "None of them were (virgins)."

This demonstration occurred nearly a month after Egypt's longtime President Hosni Mubarak stepped down amid a wave of popular and mostly peaceful unrest aimed at his ouster and the institution of democratic reforms. Afterward, Egypt's military -- which had largely stayed on the sidelines of the revolution -- officially took control of the nation's political apparatus as well, until an agreed-upon constitution and elections. The March 9 protest occurred in Tahrir Square, which became famous over 18 historic and sometimes bloody days and nights of protests that led to Mubarak's resignation. But unlike in those previous demonstrations, the Egyptian military targeted the protesters. Soldiers dragged dozens of demonstrators from the square and through the gates of the landmark Egyptian Museum.

Salwa Hosseini, a 20-year-old hairdresser and one of the women named in the Amnesty report, described to CNN how uniformed soldiers tied her up on the museum's grounds, forced her to the ground and slapped her, then shocked her with a stun gun while calling her a prostitute. "They wanted to teach us a lesson," Hosseini said soon after the Amnesty report came out. "They wanted to make us feel that we do not have dignity." The treatment got worse, Hosseini said, when she and the 16 other female prisoners were taken to a military detention center in Heikstep. There, she said, she and several of other female detainees were subjected to a "virginity test."

MORE

 

[waltky]

Long overdue...

EGYPT PRESIDENT DECREES SEXUAL HARASSMENT A CRIME
Jun. 5, 2014 — Egypt's outgoing president on Thursday decreed sexual harassment a crime punishable by up to five years in prison, a much-anticipated move toward combating the abuse deeply rooted in this Mideast country.

The decree was among several last-minute decisions by President Adly Mansour who is to hand over power on Sunday to president-elect, Egypt's former military chief Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi. The decree amends the country's current laws, which did not criminalize sexual harassment and only vaguely referred to such offenses as indecent assault. In Egypt, violence against women in public space has grown over the past three years of turmoil since the 2011 ouster of autocrat Hosni Mubarak. The decree says harassers face between six months to five years in prison, with harsher sentences reserved for offenders holding a position of power over their victims, like being a woman's superior at work or being armed with a weapon.

The decree also defines a sexual harasser as a person seeking to achieve "an interest of a sexual nature," according to presidential spokesman Ehab Badawi. Offenders would be prosecuted whether they commit harassment in public or in private, and repeat offenders would see their sentences doubled, Badawi said. Along with the maximum five-year sentence, offenders would be fined up to 5,000 Egyptian pounds, or about $714, with the maximum fine reserved for harassers who use a weapon or pressure. The decree acts as an amendment to existing laws, which may disappoint some women's rights activists who have demanded completely new legislation on the issue.

A supporter of Egypt's former military chief Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi reacts to the official announcement declaring him the next president of Egypt with 96.9 percent of the vote, and a turnout of 47.45 percent, at the Election Commission headquarters in Cairo, Egypt, Tuesday, June 3, 2014. El-Sissi's victory was never in doubt, but the career infantry officer had pushed for a massive turnout as well to bestow legitimacy on his ouster last July of Islamist President Mohammed Morsi and the ensuing crackdown on his Muslim Brotherhood and Islamist supporters.

Last year, a joint report by the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women, Egypt's Demographic Center and the National Planning Institute found that more than 99 percent of hundreds of women surveyed in seven of the country's 27 provinces reported experiencing some form of sexual harassment, ranging from minor harassment to rape. The breakdown in the police force in the wake of the 2011 uprising that ousted Mubarak left the streets in Egypt even more unsafe for women. Over the past three years, including under the year-long rule of Mubarak's successor, Islamist President Mohammed Morsi, there have also been multiple mass sexual assaults on women during political protests.

Initiatives to counter harassment also multiplied. Volunteer groups started escorting women, especially during political gatherings. Activists offered self-defense classes for women and social networking sites launched "name and shame" campaigns. However, many say harassment will continue as long as Egypt's conservative Muslim society discriminates against women, accusing them of dressing immodestly and mixing with men in public and thus provoking harassment.

MORE