MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) -- A 13-year-old girl who said she had been raped was stoned to death in Somalia after being accused of adultery by Islamic militants, a human rights group said.

Dozens of men stoned Aisha Ibrahim Duhulow to death Oct. 27 in a stadium packed with 1,000 spectators in the southern port city of Kismayo, Amnesty International and Somali media reported, citing witnesses. The Islamic militia in charge of Kismayo had accused her of adultery after she reported that three men had raped her, the rights group said.

Initial local media reports said Duhulow was 23, but her father told Amnesty International she was 13. Some of the Somali journalists who first reported the killing later told Amnesty International that they had reported she was 23 based upon her physical appearance.

Calls to Somali government officials and the local administration in Kismayo rang unanswered Saturday.

"This child suffered a horrendous death at the behest of the armed opposition groups who currently control Kismayo," David Copeman, Amnesty International's Somalia campaigner, said in a statement Friday.

Somalia is among the world's most violent and impoverished countries. The nation of some 8 million people has not had a functioning government since warlords overthrew a dictator in 1991 then turned on each other.

A quarter of Somali children die before age 5; nearly every public institution has collapsed. Fighting is a daily occurrence, with violent deaths reported nearly every day.

Islamic militants with ties to al-Qaida have been battling the government and its Ethiopian allies since their combined forces pushed the Islamists from the capital in December 2006. Within weeks of being driven out, the Islamists launched an insurgency that has killed thousands of civilians.

In recent months, the militants appear to be gaining strength. The group has taken over the port of Kismayo, Somalia's third-largest city, and dismantled pro-government roadblocks. They also effectively closed the Mogadishu airport by threatening to attack any plane using it.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/africa/11/01/amnesty.rape.somalia.ap/index.html

Religion of any sort is nothing but a cult.In any society across the world including the usa, what a way to keep the masses in their place.

Thats why we war against each other, because you know, my god is bigger than your god, and ,the way i believe is the only way,so we must kill each other to prove this point.GIVE ME A BREAK. And don't include me in your make believe ****.

This just makes me sick. And I partially agree with you, ProudLiberal.

We are animals, and the thin veneer of "civilization" cracks pretty easy. We have a long way to go in achieving any kind of spiritual life, at least a benign and loving spirit. We are omnivores and, though we eat veggies, we crave meat and rip and tear at one another. Is it any wonder our religion is one of death and destruction?

But there is light out there. There are tiny sparks of altruism and love and compassion. You and I will not see a world ruled by that spirit, but every willful act of empathy adds to the light. Each time we willfully turn from ripping and tearing and eating one another, the killing soul is deprived.

This obscenity in the name of religion sickens us. Why? Because there is some tiny spark of empathy within us that rejects the killing soul. That gives me hope.

We are animals. In our evolution, we have become self-aware. That "self" is not carnal but is abstract and we have created a world of vocabulary to deal with the abstraction. A spirit of...

We have to deal with this "self" (spirit? soul?) of which we've become aware. We can be animalistic (it is our heritage, after all). Or we can choose to explore altruistic empathy.

All abstraction is make-believe--can't opt out as much as we'd like. It's what we've become in our evolution. So we deal with it.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: LibraryKat,

Without religion, we'd surely find something else to fight over.

BTW ProudLib, I'm dying to know if you speak to people like this in person. Does anyone or anything contrary to your own belief system elicit a reaction of hate, cynicism, and profanity?

quote:

BTW ProudLib, I'm dying to know if you speak to people like this in person. Does anyone or anything contrary to your own belief system elicit a reaction of hate, cynicism, and profanity?

What's interesting is, Proudliberal comes to Enid, tells us how we're all stupid, hateful cultists, and then whines because people don't throw her a welcome party.

After those posts, I now have no sympathy for proudliberal, as I know she brought at least SOME of it on herself!

quote:

Originally posted by proudliberal:
Thats why we war against each other, because you know, my god is bigger than your god, and ,the way i believe is the only way,so we must kill each other to prove this point.GIVE ME A BREAK. And don't include me in your make believe ****.

People would war with each other even if they didn't have religion. Look at what happened in the Killing Fields of Cambodia & those people were communists & atheist.

quote:

People would war with each other even if they didn't have religion. Look at what happened in the Killing Fields of Cambodia & those people were communists & atheist.

Excellent point.

I heard a history prof who was dead on when he said, not one war has been fought over religion. Wars are about land, power, and money, and religion is just the shield they hide behind.

quote:

Originally posted by folkieokie:

quote:

BTW ProudLib, I'm dying to know if you speak to people like this in person. Does anyone or anything contrary to your own belief system elicit a reaction of hate, cynicism, and profanity?

What's interesting is, Proudliberal comes to Enid, tells us how we're all stupid, hateful cultists, and then whines because people don't throw her a welcome party.

After those posts, I now have no sympathy for proudliberal, as I know she brought at least SOME of it on herself!

Crickets. Crickets.

I think we chased her back under her bridge.

Hi, all!

quote:

Originally posted by proudliberal:
Religion of any sort is nothing but a cult.In any society across the world including the usa, what a way to keep the masses in their place.

proudliberal, I have heard this before, but always discounted it as someone wanting to be perceived as an intellectual without actually putting out serious mental effort. Please provide a structured rationale for taking your view.

Where you been hidin', Skook?

Hey, guy! Welcome back! Perfect time to re-enter the fray.

No you did not chase me away, and I still stand behind what I said.

Yeah, Mother Theresa and Gandhi were evil, vicious killers. Someone should have had them executed so they couldn't spread their evil around the world!

Proudliberal, I'm guessing people don't hate you because you're a liberal. They hate you because you're a bigot! You're no better than the Klan, you just toe the other side of the line.