Pakistan hangs child killer
LAHORE: Pakistani authorities yesterday executed a man convicted of raping and murdering a 6-year-old girl, in an incident that shocked the country and sparked riots earlier this year.
Closed-circuit television footage broadcast on television following the killing purportedly showed Zainab Fatima Ameen walking hand-in-hand with an unidentified man, in what may have been her last moments.
Imran Ali, 24, was handed four separate death sentences for the rape and murder, which took place in the eastern city of Kasur in January.
He confessed to eight attacks on children in the city, including five murders, in a spate of violence that terrorised society.
“He was hanged this morning in the presence of a prison official and the father of the victim,” an official at the central prison here said.
Zainab’s family had called for Imran to be executed in public — a move rejected by the Lahore High Court on Tuesday.
“I have a bit of satisfaction that justice has been delivered but I am not fully satisfied as he was not hanged in public,” Zainab’s father, Ameen Ansari, said.
The girl’s murder sparked outrage in Pakistan, with violence erupting in Kasur as thousands swarmed police stations and set fire to politicians’ homes, while Pakistanis took to social media demanding action.
At least 12 cases of rape and murder have been recorded in the Kasur area in the past two years. Imran confessed to eight, but four remain unsolved.