Sudanese teen flogged for wearing 'indecent' skirt

Khartoum: A Sudanese Christian teenager has been lashed 50
times for wearing what a judge considered an "indecent" knee-length skirt, her lawyer said on Saturday.

The family of Silva Kashif, 16, plans on suing police and the judge, said attorney Azhari al-Hajj, who insisted the verdict was in violation of Sudanese law because the girl is a minor.

Kashif "is a minor, not a Muslim and did not have the right to get in touch with her parents" before the verdict was served, Hajj said.

"These are violations of the law and that is why we plan on suing the police and the judge," the lawyer added.

Kashif was strolling in a south Khartoum neighbourhood earlier this month wearing a knee-length skirt when a policeman arrested her and marched her to court. She was sentenced on November 21.

"The judge sentenced her to 50 lashes and she was immediately flogged. The whole thing lasted 30 minutes," said Hajj, who is also a human rights activist.

Sudan applies Islamic law in the Muslim north but it is not in force in the Christian and semi-autonomous south, which fought a two-decade war with the north that ended in 2005.

Kashif was the latest person targeted in Sudan on charges of violating a law against public indecency.

Last month, a judge sentenced two women to 20 lashes for wearing trousers and no head scarves.