Newlyweds' Throats Slit in 'Honor Killing'

In the latest atrocity in the name of family "honor," a Pakistani couple were tied up and killed with butcher knives for marrying against the wishes of the bride's family. Muafia Bibi, 17, and her 30-year-old husband, Sajjad Ahmed, were killed in a village in Punjab province and the bride's parents, grandfather, and two uncles have been arrested, reports the Washington Post. "It is a case of honor killing," the local police chief tells the Telegraph. "The couple were not beheaded but were killed with the knives and had severe signs of torture on their heads,"

Villagers say that before the couple's throats were slit, a crowd gathered and the bride's father said even children should stay to watch the killing. "He said they should learn what would happen to them if they married someone of their own choice," a witness says. In the same region, a 20-year-old woman died after being set on fire—not by her family in this case, but by a man whose marriage proposal she had rejected. The "honor killing" problem in Pakistan came to international attention in May when a pregnant woman was stoned to death by her own family for marrying against their wishes. It later emerged that the man she married had strangled his first wife six years earlier. (More honor killings stories.)