Pakistani Senior police officers suspended in rape

Two senior police officers suspended in Pakistan, Wednesday, after the prime minister ordered a probe into allegations by a 23-year-old woman that she had been kidnapped and raped for trying to expose police corruption.

The woman came to national attention in April when she was briefly detained for mistakenly trespassing in Parliament in Islamabad. She had wandered through a security cordon when she sought to contact lawmakers to help her husband, whom she says was framed by police trying to extort money.

In an interview in The News daily on Tuesday, the woman said that armed men later seized her in the eastern city of Faisalabad and that a police inspector raped her for seeking to publicize the case.

She also accused Faisalabad police chief Khalid Abdullah of ordering her rape, a charge that prompted Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz to order a probe on Tuesday.

An official at Aziz's office on Wednesday said Abdullah and the inspector had been suspended from their posts pending the outcome of the investigation.

"We hope a team of police officers will complete their probe into these allegations and submit a report to the prime minister this week," said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity in accordance with police policy.

Also Wednesday, Pakistan's Supreme Court ordered police to investigate the woman's alleged ordeal and demanded a report within 10 days, a court statement said.

The woman said her husband was arrested in Faisalabad on false charges of forging documents for stolen vehicles. She said police didn't release him even after being paid a large bribe, and that her husband was still missing.

Abdullah has denied the allegations.

"This woman is a liar ... her character is not good, and people where she lives are quite aware of it," he told The Associated Press on Tuesday, reports the AP.