Pakistan court should not have freed the rapist after the deal to marry the victim

1. A Pakistan court should not have freed a rapist after he married his victim in a settlement brokered by a council of elders in the northwest of the country.
2. Yes it legitimises sexual violence against women in a country where a majority of rape goes unreported.
3. Dawlat Khan, 25, was sentenced in May to life imprisonment by a lower court in Buner district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province for raping a deaf women.
4. He should not have been released from prison on Monday and the Peshawar High Court should not have accepted an out-of-court settlement agreed by the rape survivor’s family.
5. The rapist and the victim are from the same extended family.
6. Both families should not have patched up and should not have entered into agreement with the help of local jirga traditional council.
7. Khan was arrested after his unmarried victim delivered a baby and the paternity test proved that he was the child’s biological father.
8. Rape should not be difficult to prosecute in Pakistan and women should not be treated as second class citizens in Pakistan.
9. The conviction rate should be in proportion of cases that go for trial.
10. Cases should be reported and should not be associated with social stigma.
11. Investigations, shoddy prosecutorial practises and out-of-court settlements should not contribute towards abysmal conviction rates.
12. Yes it is against the basic principles of justice and the law of the land.
13. In rural Pakistan village councils known as jirgas or panchayats are formed of local elders should not bypass the justice system and their decisions should have no legal value.