16-year-old girl raped in moving ambulance in MP's Mauganj; main accused, driver held
Mauganj (MP), Nov 28: A 16-year-old girl was allegedly raped in a moving ambulance in Mauganj district of Madhya Pradesh, police said on Thursday.
The shocking incident in the ambulance being operated under '108' emergency service took place on November 22 and two of the four accused in the case, including the driver, have been arrested, they said.
The girl, accompanied by her sister and brother-in-law, was travelling in the ambulance (none of them was a patient), said Deputy Inspector General (Rewa Range) Saket Pandey.
Besides the trio, two more persons, the driver and his associate, were inside the patient transport vehicle, he said.
Pandey told PTI that the minor along with her sister and brother-in-law, both later charged with aiding the crime, set off for their destination in the ambulance whose driver was known to them.
En route, the girl's sister and her brother-in-law got down from the vehicle on pretexting of fetching water. The ambulance driver, instead of waiting for the couple, sped away, said the officer.
Later, the driver's associate travelling with him, Rajesh Kewat, raped her in the moving ambulance at Sunsan village on November 22, he added.
After keeping the girl hostage for the whole night, the two accused dumped her on the roadside the next morning, the DIG said.
After reaching home, the survivor narrated the ordeal to her mother, who for two days did not approach police fearing the incident would tarnish the family's image, according to the IPS officer.
On November 25, the victim and her mother finally approached the police who registered a case against four people (aged 25 to 30 years), including the alleged rapist (Kewat), on their complaint, Pandey said.
He said two accused, ambulance driver Virendra Chaturvedi and his associate Kewat, were arrested on Wednesday.
A hunt has been launched to apprehend the girl's sister and brother-in-law, who have been charged with abetting the crime, said the IPS officer.
All the accused have been booked under relevant sections of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act and the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita.
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Israel launches first airstrike on Lebanon since ceasefire, accusing Hezbollah of breaching truce
Beirut, Nov 28: The Israeli military on Thursday said its warplanes fired on southern Lebanon after detecting Hezbollah activity at a rocket storage facility, the first Israeli airstrike a day after a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah took hold.
There was no immediate word on casualties from Israel's aerial attack, which came hours after the Israeli military said it fired on people trying to return to certain areas in southern Lebanon. Israel said they were violating the ceasefire agreement, without providing details. Lebanon's state-run National News Agency said two people were wounded.
The back-to-back incidents stirred unease about the agreement, brokered by the United States and France, which includes an initial two-month ceasefire in which Hezbollah members are to withdraw north of the Litani River and Israeli forces are to return to their side of the border. The buffer zone would be patrolled by Lebanese troops and UN peacekeepers.
On Thursday, the second day of a ceasefire after more than a year of bloody conflict between Israel and Hezbollah, Lebanon's state news agency reported that Israeli fire targeted civilians in Markaba, close to the border, without providing further details. Israel said it fired artillery in three other locations near the border. There were no immediate reports of casualties.
An Associated Press reporter in northern Israel near the border heard Israeli drones buzzing overhead and the sound of artillery strikes from the Lebanese side.
The Israeli military said in a statement that “several suspects were identified arriving with vehicles to a number of areas in southern Lebanon, breaching the conditions of the ceasefire.” It said troops “opened fire toward them” and would “actively enforce violations of the ceasefire agreement.”
Israeli officials have said forces will be withdrawn gradually as it ensures that the agreement is being enforced. Israel has warned people not to return to areas where troops are deployed, and says it reserves the right to strike Hezbollah if it violates the terms of the truce.
A Lebanese military official said Lebanese troops would gradually deploy in the south as Israeli troops withdraw. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief media.
The ceasefire agreement announced late Tuesday ended 14 months of conflict between Israel and Hezbollah that began a day after Hamas' Oct. 7, 2023 attack out of Gaza, when the Lebanese Hezbollah group began firing rockets, drones and missiles in solidarity.
Israel retaliated with airstrikes, and the conflict steadily intensified for nearly a year before boiling over into all-out war in mid-September. The war in Gaza is still raging with no end in sight.
More than 3,760 people were killed by Israeli fire in Lebanon during the conflict, many of them civilians, according to Lebanese health officials. The fighting killed more than 70 people in Israel — over half of them civilians — as well as dozens of Israeli soldiers fighting in southern Lebanon.
Some 1.2 million people were displaced in Lebanon, and thousands began streaming back to their homes on Wednesday despite warnings from the Lebanese military and the Israeli army to stay out of certain areas. Some 50,000 people were displaced on the Israeli side, but few have returned and the communities near the northern border are still largely deserted.
In Menara, an Israeli community on the border with views into Lebanon, around three quarters of homes are damaged, some with collapsed roofs and burnt-out interiors. A few residents could be seen gathering their belongings on Thursday before leaving again.
