Maria Sadaqat, a Pakistan young woman who was at home watching her 5 year old sister while her parents and other siblings attended a funeral in a nearby village died June 1 after she was tortured and burned alive for refusing a marriage proposal from the son of a former colleague. According to the police, the teenager was attacked by a group of people on in the village of Upper Dewal close to the summer hill resort of Murree, outside the capital Islamabad. Her father said they were at a funeral when they received news of the attack and rushed home. He said she was severely burned and had to be rushed to a hospital and the one closest to the village was about 30 miles away. Abdul Basit, Sadaqat’s uncle, who was interviewed outside a burns centre at Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences in the capital of the country said: “She was badly tortured and then burned alive. We brought her to hospital in Islamabad but she succumbed to her wounds today,” Basit said his niece had been attacked by the principal of the private school where she had formerly worked as a teacher and by his accomplices after she refused a marriage proposal from his son. “He was divorced and twice her age, so she refused the proposal and left her job when they pursued her time and again… eventually they attacked her,” Basit said. Grieving relatives outside the center wept and protested at the teenager’s death as police moved her body to another hospital for a post-mortem. Police said Sadaqat gave a statement before her death naming the principal and four others as her attackers. “We have arrested at least one of the accused and a hunt is on for the rest,” Mazhar Iqbal, the officer directing the murder investigation, told AFP. A doctor at the hospital said Sadaqat had succumbed to serious burns. “The poor woman was becoming better but then could not survive because most parts of her body had serious burn injuries,” said Ayesha Ihsani. Recall that this is the second time in just over a month that a Pakistani woman has been murdered over a marriage issue.
SRC NAIJ NEWS
SRC NAIJ NEWS
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