I posted an item a couple of days ago about a journalist having been arrested after interviewing a woman who claimed she was raped by Somali soldiers.
Now the country's police commissioner, General Sharif Sheikhuna Maye, has issued a statement accusing the journalist, Abdiaziz Abdinur Ibrahim, and the alleged victim, Lul Ali Hassan, of concocting a false story.
He said medical examinations of the victim showed no evidence of rape, according to Somalia's Hiiraan Online. He said she confessed to police that she fabricated her story because she was told that she would get money and extra rations at the displaced persons camp where she was living.
The police chief says Ibrahim and members of a Somali women's rights group bribed Hassan to claim that she was raped.
The Somali president, Hassan Sheikh Mohamud, referred to the case during his visit to Washington DC. He said he would not interfere in the judicial process.
He said: "If he [the journalist] is guilty, he will go through process of the law. If he is innocent he will be freed."
When Mohamud took office in November he said: "My government has zero tolerance for the rape issue. We do not intend to be flexible when it comes to rape."
Sources: Africa.com/Hiiraan Online
