Parents of eight raped, murdered girls plead for justice in Pakistan top court

Following the rape and murder of Zainab, a six-year-old Pakistani girl, the parents of eight other girls with similar cases appeared for a hearing in front of a special bench of the Supreme Court headed by Chief Justice of Pakistan Mian Saqib Nisar.

The parents pleaded before a three-member bench of the apex court saying, “give us justice”.

The Joint Investigation Team on Zainab’s murder case presented a progress report detailing their investigations thus far. The court was dissatisfied with the progress.

“So many incidents have taken place, what was the police doing?” the court questioned, according to the Dawn newspaper.

“The incidents took place repeatedly in the remit of two police stations and no one conducted an inquiry,” the chief justice said. 

The investigative team said they retrieved DNA from 800 suspects, adding that the DNA found on Zainab matched seven other cases that also happened in Kasur since 2015.

The bench said that if the police had taken the matter seriously three years ago, the eight girls could have been saved, according to the Dawn newspaper.

No real progress has been made in the case since Zainab's body was found, despite the Counter-Terrorism Department, Intelligence Bureau, Special Branch and Punjab Forensic Science Agency each being tasked with investigating the case, according to the newspaper.

source: Alarabiya