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Report: Five Pakistani women killed for dancing at wedding

Hal Libby Contributor
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Five Pakistani women were put to death by tribal elders for dancing and signing at a wedding, The Daily Mail reports.

The town’s jirga, or tribal council, sentenced the five women and two men to death after footage of them dancing surfaced. Such dancing is prohibited by local law. According to the jirga, the women were guilty of fornication and staining their families’ names.

The town is located in Pakistan’s mountainous Kohistan district, and is two days from the nearest road by foot, leading to vague reports.

It is currently unclear if the women were killed by shooting or by having their throats cut. In fact, some even dispute that the women are dead. The local provincial government sent police to investigate the deaths and claims they are still alive.

Unfortunately, this seems unlikely.

After news of the case attracted widespread repulsion, the Pakistani Supreme Court demanded to have the women brought before the court, but judges were told the weather was too bad.

The two convicted men, who escaped death by fleeing the town, told the Chief Justice that the women had already been slain.

One of men’s brothers said, “All the five girls — Bazgar, Amna, Shaheen, Begum and one more — [were] killed by the jirga on May 30. I have four witnesses of the killing.” He also claimed the jirga sent 50 men to find and murder his brother.

A Kohistan district police officer told Agence France-Presse in late May that he believed the supposed infraction was used as a pretext to exact tribal veangence. The same police officer said that he had viewed a video of the dancing and found that the men and women were shown separately.

Tags : pakistan
Hal Libby