French woman, children held captive by husband for 12 years rescued in Pakistan
A French woman and her five children have been rescued in Pakistan after police said they had been confined and abused by the family’s father, a Pakistani national, for more than a decade.The rescue took place in Bara, a remote town in Pakistan’s north-western Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, after one of the couple’s sons managed to slip away from the family home and alert authorities.Police raided the property and arrested the woman’s husband, who is accused of holding his wife and children captive and subjecting them to years of physical and mental abuse.According to local police, officers found 54-year-old French national Sylvie Yasmina and her children living in a cramped and “extremely dilapidated room”. The family members had bruises on their bodies when they were discovered.Yasmina alleged that her husband had “effectively imprisoned” the family since they moved to Pakistan from Australia in 2014.Police told BBC that Yasmina described her husband as “very violent” and claimed he assaulted family members physically and mentally “on a daily basis”.The woman and her children have since been moved to a women’s shelter in the city of Peshawar. Police say they are now planning to return to France. Yasmina said she had been cut off from the outside world for years and was not allowed to interact with other people.”According to the woman… She was not allowed to meet anyone, their two older children had missed their studies, while the three younger children were born in Pakistan and never enrolled in school,” a senior police officer told BBC.Authorities have not publicly identified the husband, a Pakistani national. Police said he had been “residing illegally” in Australia when he met Yasmina.The couple married in 2003 and lived in Australia for more than a decade before relocating to Pakistan with their two eldest children in 2014.In a statement given to police, Yasmina described years of alleged abuse and control.”We were deprived [of our] freedom, my husband didn’t take care of us the way he should as a husband and the father of my children. He beats us and put pressure on our lives on a daily basis,” Yasmina wrote.She also expressed fears about the impact on her children after years of isolation.”I felt that my future was already ruined, the future of the children would also be ruined.”Police are continuing their investigation into the allegations while arrangements are being made for Yasmina and her children to leave Pakistan and return to France.
