Did Nawaz Sharif Pursue Kim Barker?

[Riaz Haq]

Kim Barker, an American reporter who covered Afghanistan and Pakistan for Chicago Tribune starting in 2003, claims that she was propositioned by Pakistan Muslim League leader Nawaz Sharif when she met him for interviews for her newspaper.



In an interview with KERA radio, Barker said she followed her bosses advice to try and blend with the local population. However, being a young white female journalist with blue eyes who stands at 5 ft 10 in tall, she says she received unusual attention from the men she met to do her job in Afghanistan and Pakistan. In her recently released book "The Taliban Shuffle: Strange Days in Afghanistan and Pakistan", Barker recounts how Nawaz Sharif gave her an Apple iphone as a gift and asked her to be his "special friend". When she declined Nawaz Sharif's sexual advance, Foreign Policy Magazine reports that he offered to set her up with President Asif Ali Zardari.

This latest report adds Sharif's name to the "illustrious" list of senior Pakistani political leaders who have made news for their dalliances with women.

A 2007 Youtube video showing Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani groping Sherry Rehman attracted a lot of attention. Then, President Asif Ali Zardari was shown gushing about US Vice Presidential candi..., and asking to "hug" her during a meeting in New York.

Related Links:

Haq's Musings

Kim Barker's Radio Interview

Ode to Feudal Prince of Pakistan

Foreign Policy Magazine Review of "Taliban Shuffle"

Incompetence Worse Than Graft in Pakistan

The Taliban Shuffle: Strange Days in Afghanistan and Pakistan By Ki...

Comparing US and Pakistani Tax Evaders

Zardari-Palin Meeting in New York

[Riaz Haq]

In a bombshell, US blogger Cynthia Ritchie accuses PPP's Rehman Malik of rape

https://www.dawn.com/news/1561548/in-a-bombshell-us-blogger-cynthia...

"In 2011, I was raped by the former interior minister Rehman Malik. That's right, I'll say it again. I was raped by the then interior minister Rehman Malik," she said a live video on her Facebook page, also accusing former federal minister Makhdoom Shahabuddin and ex-prime minister Yousuf Raza Gilani of "physically manhandling" her while Gilani was staying at the "President's House".
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The conflict between the PPP and Pakistan-based American blogger Cynthia D. Ritchie intensified on Friday after the latter came out with allegations of rape and assault against some top PPP leaders.

Ritchie, who was at the centre of a controversy last week when she tweeted what the PPP described as "derogatory and slanderous remarks" about slain former prime minister Benazir Bhutto, accused former interior minister Senator Rehman Malik of having raped her in Islamabad in 2011 — a charge the senior PPP leader has strongly denied.

"In 2011, I was raped by the former interior minister Rehman Malik. That's right, I'll say it again. I was raped by the then interior minister Rehman Malik," she said a live video on her Facebook page, also accusing former federal minister Makhdoom Shahabuddin and ex-prime minister Yousuf Raza Gilani of "physically manhandling" her while Gilani was staying at the "President's House".

Gilani also denied the allegations in a statement and later said he would file a defamation suit against Ritchie.

Ritchie said she was reserving "some of the more graphic details" because her audience could include children, but added that she would be "happy to go into more detail" with neutral investigative journalists.

The blogger has nearly 220,000 followers on Twitter and a hashtag championing her as a "pride of Pakistan" (#CynthiaIsPrideOfPakistan) was the top trend on Friday evening.

In a tweet before going live on Facebook, the American alleged members of "#ZardarisFilthyPPP" were threatening her because "they know that over the years I have been raped/assaulted by men in the highest ranks of PPP. They don't want the world to know."