PAKISTANI MAN GUNS DOWN FORMER FIANCÉE AND NINE RELATIVES OVER MARRIAGE DISPUTE
He was already wanted for the deaths of his own parents over a
marriage-proposal dispute months earlier. Then, on Sunday April 5, the
man resurfaced in a northwestern village in Pakistan, where he
killed his former fiancée and nine others, authorities said.
The suspected killer, identified as Gal Ahmed Said by police in
the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province’s Charsadda district, carried out the
pre-dawn attack in the home of his uncle, who had further delayed the
marriage, police told the New York Times.
![]() |
Pakistani mourners
gather around dead bodies after their killing in Peshawar on April 5.
(AFP/Getty Images)
|
“He stormed the house and killed all ten family members while they were
asleep,” Charsadda police chief Shafiullah Khan told AFP.
Said, who fled following the massacre, had wanted to marry his
24-year-old cousin, Naveeda, who was among the dead. Also killed
were Said’s uncle, Jamal, an aunt, four male cousins and three
female cousins. There were two children among the dead, according to numerous reports.
The root of the dispute reportedly began months ago. Said’s father
wanted the marriage to wait until after the family had money to build a
new room to accommodate the couple, the Times reported. Police told AFP that
Said’s father turned down a dowry settlement.
Authorities believe Said, who is in his 20s, shot and killed his own
parents and two other relatives in November; one of the relatives was his
brother, the Associated Press reported.
“There was a dispute over a marriage proposal,” Khan told the Times. “Mr. Said could not wait
and opened fire on his family.”
Said has been wanted since. Relatives told
Pakistan’s Dawn newspaper that the previous murders also led to
the uncle’s refusal to allow his daughter to marry Said.
“The uncle was being very indecisive about the wedding which infuriated
Gul Ahmad,” police officer Mohammad Jamil told Reuters.
Neighbors took the bodies to a district hospital; officials told the
Times that the victims had been shot in their heads and faces. An AK-47 assault
rifle was used in the attack in the conservative, mountainous region of
the country, AFP reported.
culled from washingtonpost.com
Comments
Post a Comment