LAHORE: A court sentenced a woman to death on Monday for burning her daughter alive as punishment for marrying without the family’s consent.
Perveen Bibi confessed before a special court in Lahore to killing her daughter in June for what she said was “bringing shame to the family”.
Police said 18-year-old Zeenat Rafiq married Hassan Khan and eloped to live with his family a week before she was killed.
The court sentenced Zeenat’s brother Anees to life in prison after the evidence showed her mother and brother had first beaten her before her mother threw kerosene on her and set her on fire.
After her murder none of her relatives sought to claim her body, police said, leaving her husband’s family to bury her charred remains after dark in a graveyard near the city.
Parliament passed legislation against “honour killings” in October, three months after the murder of social media star Qandeel Baloch. Her brother was arrested in relation to her strangling death in July.
In most cases, the victim is a woman and the killer is a relative who escapes punishment by seeking forgiveness for the crime from family members.
Under the new law, relatives can forgive convicts in the case of a death sentence, but they would still have to face a mandatory life sentence.
