Pakistani wife in disputed marriage gunned down in court by her brother

[Eugene]

Source: The Guardian

Pakistani wife in disputed marriage gunned down in court by her brother

Jon Boone in Islamabad
guardian.co.uk, Sunday 5 August 2012 15.23 BST

So-called honour killings by families who believe their daughters have disgraced them are increasingly common in Pakistan. But the gunning down last week of a woman by her brother, a lawyer, in front of dozens of witnesses in a packed courtroom in the bustling city of Hyderabad marks an alarming new low.

The family of 22 year-old Raheela Sehto had already made their fury at her marriage to Zulfiqar Sehto – a love match struck without their permission – abundantly clear. They reacted by filing a claim with local police that their daughter had been kidnapped by her 30-year-old husband, a life-long neighbour who had wooed Raheela over the years, although largely through clandestine mobile phone conversations.

Her uncle had tried to throttle her with a scarf at an earlier appearance at the high court in Hyderabad in July. The couple had petitioned the court for its protection and to try and have the kidnapping charges thrown out.

But Sehto, a university graduate working for the local electricity company, said they felt they had no reason to fear for their lives in court, even when in the earlier part of the morning he was sitting almost directly in front of his wife's eventual killer, Javed Iqbal Shaikh, her brother.

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Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/aug/05/pakistani-wife-marriage-brother

[4th law of robotics]

1. As long as the people who do this become local heroes rather than pariahs the practice will continue

regardless of what the law says.