[Current Affairs] October 09,2020 Top Pakistan Current Affairs for FPSC Test Preparation

What’s going on? Brace yourself for a tragic dejavu. The body of a two-year-old girl named Zainab was found in Peshawar’s Jabba Korona area. According to police, she appears to have been sexually assaulted and tortured before being killed. Zainab went missing on Tuesday evening in Charsadda, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (KP) while playing with other kids outside her house. On Wednesday, police recovered her body and are waiting for a medical report.

The details: The police registered a First Information Report (FIR) against unidentified kidnappers after Zainab’s father filed a complaint. KP’s Chief Minister took notice of the incident and said the family would get justice. Inspector General of Police for KP, Sanaullah Abbasi, visited Zainab’s family and said the police will arrest the culprits soon.

The context: Is this case reminding you of the time another minor girl named Zainab was assaulted and killed in Kasur? In 2018, six-year-old Zainab’s body was found in a heap of trash after she went missing. Her abductors tortured and sexually assaulted her. Zainab was reportedly kidnapped near a religious tuition center near her house. Her parents were in Saudi Arabia performing Umrah at the time, and she was staying with her maternal aunt. This incident sparked protests and shutter-down strikes in Kasur.

Looking ahead: Around two years after Zainab’s death in 2018, the National Assembly passed the Zainab Alert, Response, and Recovery Bill, which aims to speed up punishments and investigations in child abuse cases. Sindh police also launched the Zainab Alert Mobile app to keep track of missing children cases that have been reported or solved. The app is supposed to alert police when a child goes missing.

The bottom line: Violence against children is continuing in Pakistan. 1,489 children have reportedly been sexually abused in the first half of 2020. Crimes against children include abduction, rape, sodomy, gang-rape, and gang-sodomy.

• Public response: People are shocked this incident happened inside a university campus. They are demanding heightened security on campus, and urging the university to investigate.

4. World Bank predicts subpar economic growth for Pakistan

According to a recent South Asia Economic Focus report by the World Bank, the economic situation in Pakistan isn’t looking good. The report claims that Pakistan’s economy took a beating following measures to contain the spread of COVID-19. The report warned that Pakistan could experience an increase in poverty, coupled with an uncertain economic recovery. The report also predicted that around 930,000 children are expected to drop out of primary and secondary school. Nearly 22 million children in Pakistan are already out of school. The World Bank’s forecast for South Asia as a whole was also pretty grim.