A 29-year-old pharmacist has been arrested on charges of man slaughter after causing a man to drown while exorcising a jinn from his body. The incident took place on Wednesday at 7pm when the pharmacist, the victim, and two other compatriots went to the beach as per the request of the victim to cleanse his body. Read more here.
A village witch doctor has been arrested for robbing, raping and killing a Plutaluang woman looking for a spell to enchant her estranged husband. Read more here.
Jaipur, April 19 (IANS) A self-proclaimed witch doctor was arrested in Rajasthan’s Bikaner district Friday for allegedly repeatedly raping a woman over six months on the pretext of exorcising an evil spirit that he claimed possessed her, police said. Read more here.
Dhegani Mahato, a 40-year-old mother of two, was burned alive in Nepal after being declared a witch. The attack occurred Friday in Bagauda, 50 miles south of Nepal’s capital, Kathmandu. According to police, Mahato was attacked by family members and other residents after a shaman accused her of casting a spell to make a relative sick. Read more here.
RAIPUR: In the wake of rise in unfair practises due to superstition and horror, a social activist, actively working against supernatural beliefs and witchcraft, has written to chief minister Raman Singh calling for a ban on films and serials based on superstition in the state. Read more here.
Johannesburg – Injuries suffered by a teenage girl who died after being set alight in an apparent satanic ritual were enough to kill her, a pathologist testified on Thursday. Read more here.
Rumbidzai Mayere (34) who was a well known Zimbabwean vendor in Makhado disappeared on March 16. Her body was discovered dumped in a bushy area and her arm and private parts had been cut off and both her eyes had been removed, apparently while she was still alive. Her boyfriend, Freddy Azwitamisi Tshikhudo (38) was arrested. Read more here.
Children with albinism (“CWA” – commonly referred to as “albinos”) are a particularly endangered group due to the difficult circumstances in the sub Saharan Africa region. A good number are killed at birth, others abandoned in early childhood, still others are killed by exposure to sunlight and skin cancer.
More recently, scores with albinism including children have been killed due to the witchcraft-related belief that their body parts can be used to create wealth and good luck when used in witchcraft potions. To date there have been 71 documented killings of Persons With Albinism (PWA), 30 Survivors and 17 grave robberies. A majority (over half) of these victims are under the age of 18. The following brief carried out by Under the Same Sun discusses the issues faced by ‘CWA’. Read more here.
Recent media reports have indicated that Ugandan children are at risk of being sacrificed by witch doctors, with the freshest case being in Gulu where two children survived being slaughtered by perpetrators of witch craft. John Tugume interviewed Kole County MP Fred Ebil (UPC), who is also a member of the Human rights committee of Parliament, on how the vice can be done away with. Read the interview here.
POLICE in Lusaka have managed to trace the body of the Taxi driver who went missing in Prechem-Kabangwe area. Read more here.
