Police in the Indian capital Delhi are investigating
the alleged gang rape of a Danish woman who lost her way near her city center hotel.
The 51-year-old tourist was attacked by a group of
men in the Paharganj area on Tuesday evening. Police say she was robbed and
raped at knife point.
A German woman has also been raped in south India,
Der Spiegel reports.
Scrutiny of sexual violence in India has grown since
the 2012 gang rape and murder of a student on a Delhi bus.
The government tightened laws on sexual violence
last year after widespread protests following the attack.
But violence and discrimination against women remain
deeply entrenched in India's staunchly patriarchal society.
The Danish woman told police that she approached the
group of men after losing her way back to her hotel near New Delhi Railway
Station.
The men robbed her of her belongings and raped her,
police spokesman Rajan Bhagat told the BBC.
"She reached her hotel and reported the
incident to the manager who called in the police and the investigation is now
under way," Mr Bhagat said.
The woman flew out of India on Wednesday morning,
police say.
No arrests have been made yet, but police are
questioning a number of men in connection with the attack.
The Danish woman is believed to have been travelling
alone and had been in Delhi since Monday after visiting the Taj Mahal, the
BBC's Andrew North in Delhi reports.
Police say she gave a detailed statement in the
presence of the Danish ambassador before leaving the country, AFP news agency
reports. There was no immediate comment from the Danish embassy in Delhi.
Paharganj, a busy backpacker district frequented by
foreign tourists, is located in the heart of the Indian capital, not far from
Connaught Place.
An 18-year-old German woman was reportedly raped by
a man sharing her compartment on a train travelling from Mangalore to Chennai
in southern India on Friday.
A man, described as a migrant worker from Bihar
state, was recently arrested, Der Spiegel newspaper reported.
Last March a Swiss tourist was gang raped and her
partner attacked by a group of men in Madhya Pradesh state. Six men were jailed
for life for the attack this past July.
Since the December 2012 Delhi gang rape, the nation
has been shocked by a string of brutal rapes of Indian women.
They include a photojournalist raped in broad
daylight in central Mumbai, a 21-year-old woman raped by two apparently
unrelated groups of men on Christmas Eve in Pondicherry and a 16-year-old girl
who died after being gang-raped twice and then set on fire in the eastern city
of Calcutta.


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