Student abuse clip filmed in Pakistan, not Bangladesh
"How inhumane can it be for something to make this possible! This is how tickets to heaven are given in some madrasas in Bangladesh," reads a Bengali-language Facebook post on April 27, 2025.
It includes graphic footage of a crying child suspended head down while other students read books inside a madrasa, an educational institution with a curriculum combining Islamic theology and general sciences (archived link).
Similar posts spread on Facebook following reports of teachers physically assaulting students in madrasas in Bangladesh including an incident that allegedly led to the death of a young boy (archived here and here).
But the circulating video is old and not taken in Bangladesh.
A reverse image search of keyframes found it earlier posted on the Facebook account of Pakistan's Express News television channel on June 29, 2019 (archived link).
"Man arrested for torturing a child hanging upside down in madrasa," reads the post's Urdu-language caption.
Subsequent keyword searches found similar visuals embedded in Geo News and The Express Tribune reports in June 2019 (archived link).
The incident occurred several months prior after which there was a settlement between the parties involved, according to The Express Tribune report.
Police in Pakistan's Rawalpindi city said they conducted an investigation when the clip went viral and arrested the teacher who allegedly tied the child up (archived link).
AFP reached out to the police but a representative said no update could be provided as the case is old.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Bloomberg
3 hours ago
- Bloomberg
Bangladesh's Yunus Announces Plan to Hold Election in April 2026
Bangladesh 's interim leader Muhammad Yunus has announced that the next national election will be held in the first half of April 2026, narrowing the timeline from his earlier range of December to June and setting a clear target for the return to an elected government in the South Asian nation. 'One of the major responsibilities of this government is to ensure that the next election is clean, festive, peaceful and widely participatory. An election that ensures the country does not face yet another crisis in the future,' Yunus said in a televised speech Friday.
New York Times
3 hours ago
- New York Times
Interpol Arrests 20 Over Network That Distributed Child Sex Abuse Material
Twenty people in Europe, the United States and South America have been arrested as part of an investigation into an international network that produced and distributed child sexual abuse material, Interpol said on Friday. The policing organization said the network was also thought to extend to Asia and the Pacific region. The arrests, which took place in 12 countries, were the result of a cross-border inquiry in which investigators tracked the illegal material online to people who viewed or downloaded it, according to Interpol. The sweep made public by Interpol on Friday included arrests in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Bulgaria, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Honduras, Italy, Paraguay, Portugal, Spain and the United States. It also led investigators to 68 other suspects in 28 countries, including the Americas, Asia, Europe and Oceania, according to Interpol and the Spanish police. The investigation began last year in Spain, where officers from the national police force's specialized cyberpatrols came across suspicious instant messaging groups, the Spanish police said in a statement on Friday. The police said the online groups had been set up exclusively to distribute images of child sexual exploitation. As the authorities in Spain became aware that the network behind the online messaging forums was international, they began to work with the Interpol, where investigators broadened the operation to South America, Interpol said. In the arrests announced on Friday, the police in Spain said they had detained seven people in five provinces, and seized cellphones, computers and storage devices. Investigators found that in some cases, those suspected of viewing or downloading the illegal images worked with children. In Seville in southern Spain, the police arrested a schoolteacher whom they accused of being in possession of exploitative images and belonging to several chat groups through which the illegal material was distributed. In Barcelona Province, the police arrested a health worker who treated children; the police said that he was suspected of paying minors in Eastern Europe for sexually explicit images. The police said that one man who was arrested in the town of El Masnou in Barcelona Province had downloaded a messaging app to watch the illegal material and later deleted the app to hide his activities from his family. In Latin America, officers arrested a teacher in Panama and 12 other people in countries across the region, Interpol said.
Washington Post
3 hours ago
- Washington Post
Bangladesh to hold national elections in April 2026, interim leader Yunus says
DHAKA, Bangladesh — Bangladesh's interim leader Muhammad Yunus on Friday said that the country will hold national elections in the first half of April 2026. In a televised address to the nation on Friday, the Nobel Peace Prize laureate said that the Election Commission would roll out a detailed roadmap for the election in due course.
