https://arab.news/rjpk3
- Viral video clip shows couple being shot at by armed men for marrying of their choice
- Balochistan chief minister says operation ongoing, vows all those involved will be arrested
ISLAMABAD: Pakistani authorities have arrested 11 suspects for their involvement in the recent “honor killing” of a couple in the southwestern Balochistan province, Chief Minister Sarfraz Bugti said on Monday after a disturbing video of the incident went viral online last week.
The provincial government sprang into action on Sunday after a video clip, which shows a couple in Balochistan being shot at by armed men for marrying of their choice, sparked nationwide outrage and calls for bringing the perpetrators to justice.
Bugti had taken to social media on Sunday to announce that one person had been arrested in connection with the incident. Speaking at a press conference in Karachi, Balochistan government spokesman Shahid Rind had said the incident captured in the viral video had taken place in Balochistan around Eid Al-Adha.
“Update: So far, 11 suspects have been arrested and the operation is ongoing,” the Balochistan chief minister wrote on X.
“All those involved will be brought to justice. The state stands with the oppressed.”
So-called honor killings are common in Pakistan, where family members and relatives sometimes kill women and men who don’t follow local traditions and culture or decide to marry of their own choice.
Rind had said on Sunday that families of both victims had not reported the incident, vowing that the government would register a case over the incident with the state as a complainant.
The couple had been executed on the orders of a jirga, a council of tribal elders, according to reports. Rind said authorities had taken the suspects’ data after their identification through the viral video clip.
The incident also prompted condemnation from the Pakistan Ulema Council (PUC), a group of clerics and religious scholars, who said the killing of a woman or a man in the name of honor is “un-Islamic, anti-Sharia and terrorism.”
The PUC said “terrorism” cases should be filed against people involved in such incidents.
“Pakistan Ulema Council demands of Chief Minister Balochistan, Governor Balochistan and IGP Balochistan to arrest the culprits who killed a woman under ‘honor killing’ as depicted in a viral video on social media,” the council said in a statement on Sunday.