Cape Town (S. Africa), Dec. 7 : Lesbians in South Africa are being dragged off the street and being raped to "correct" them, it has been claimed.

Sky News has found evidence of widespread abuse against the lesbian community, resulting in a new trend of so-called "corrective rape".

In the the township of Khayelitsha, on the outskirts of Cape Town, Sky spoke to a group of women who said they live in fear of their lives.

All of them said they know someone who has been violently dragged off the streets and raped because they had come out as a lesbian.

Funeka Solidaat said she had been attacked on two occasions - on the second she was raped.

She said the men covered their faces with balaclavas and that she had been repeatedly threatened with rape in the township.

What shocked her even more, she said, was the attitude of the police.

She was made to feel like "a laughing stock" when she reported the crime.

The police did not even bother to finish taking a statement from her, she maintained.

In Soweto, South Africa''s biggest township, a majority of the men said lesbians should be whipped and raped. They said undergoing such punishment would teach them the lessons of their lives.

They said "women should behave like women" and this was a way of "teaching" them that. (ANI)