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| Lara Logan, moments before she was attacked in Tahrir Square |
This story isn't getting much airplay, perhaps at the request of the family of CBS reporter Lara Logan.
Lara Logan, the CBS News correspondent, was attacked and sexually assaulted by a mob in Cairo on Feb. 11, the day that the Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak was forced from power, the network said Tuesday.This is a horrible story, evoking grim images. I'm sure I don't want to know the details of the attack. To be isolated and attacked by a savage, insane gang --it's an image to match anything that might be conjured by Cormac McCarthy or Edgar Allen Poe.
After the mob surrounded her, Ms. Logan “suffered a brutal and sustained sexual assault and beating before being saved by a group of women and an estimated 20 Egyptian soldiers,” the network said in a statement. Ms. Logan is recovering at a hospital in the United States.
The evening of the attack, Ms. Logan, 39, the network’s chief foreign affairs correspondent, was covering the celebrations in Tahrir Square in central Cairo with a camera crew and an unknown number of security staff members. The CBS team was enveloped by “a dangerous element” within the crowd, CBS said, that numbered more than 200 people. That mob separated Ms. Logan from her team and then attacked her.
Once she was rescued, CBS said she “reconnected” with the team and returned to the United States on Feb. 12.
The CBS statement mentioned nothing more about the attackers. It also said that there would be “no further comment from CBS News, and correspondent Logan and her family respectfully request privacy at this time.”
When I first learned of the story, I was sickened. It seemed a stain so ugly as to irreparably mar the triumph that Egyptians (indeed, the entire world) enjoy in the wake of the largely bloodless overthrow of a corrupt government.
But, then, I was struck by a horrifying realization: What happened to Lara Logan in Cairo, might happen to anyone, anywhere, at any time.
- Queens, New York, 1964
- Manhattan, New York, 1989
- St. Paul, Minnesota, 2007
- Richmond, California, 2009
Ours is a feverish world.
1 comment:
Hey there Dade:
I went to bed last night with a knot in my soul.
I looked at a few comment boards and found people using this despicable act to call Muslims/Arabs/Islam all kinds of racist names.
Very little attention was paid to the fact that it was Muslims/Arabs who came to Ms. Logan's rescue.
Here in South Africa the media emphasis was on the fact that she was born in South Africa but not much more.
I expect that more details will follow.
CBS should have done a better job in reporting the story no doubt.
Nonetheless, what a terrible incident!
Onward!
Ridwan
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