FRIGHTENING reports from Afghanistan suggest that self-immolation by women is on the rise.
The Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission has published testimonies showing that life for women in Afghanistan remains so bleak that many choose a horrific and painful death instead.
The group interviewed about 800 Afghans whose sisters, daughters and daughters-in-law have killed themselves by self-immolation to escape domestic abuse, forced marriage and other misogynistic social customs.
Reports from Herat, in western Afghanistan, show about 90 women set fire to themselves last year there and more than 70 percent died. Afghanistan's poor health system can do little for the badly burned.
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