Pak court acquits all accused in Pakistani-Italian woman's murder case

A Pakistani court on Friday acquitted all the accused in the murder case of a 26-year-old Pakistani-Italian woman Sana Cheema.

District and Sessions (Gujrat) judge Amir Mukhtar Gondal ordered the release of the father of Sana Cheema's father Ghulam Mustafa Cheema, her uncle Mazahar Cheema and her brother Adnan Cheema on "benefit of doubt".

In a suspected case of honour killing, Sana was by her father, brother, and uncle for resisting their proposal to marry a relative.

The three killed thw woman in her hometown of Mangowal in Gujrat, some 150kms from Lahore, in April last as she wanted to marry a man of her will in Italy.

Declaring her death as "accidental", her family buried her in a graveyard far from their residence.

Police arrested the three men after an Italian publication claimed that Sana had been murdered in the name of 'honour' in her hometown.

Sana had been living in Italy since 2002 and was to return to Italy on April 19 but she was killed a day prior to her return.

She wanted to marry an Italian man and had turned down proposals from within her family. She came to Pakistan some two months ago. Sana was working as a driving instructor in Italy.

The body of Sana was exhumed on April 24 on the court's order as police suspected that she might have been killed in the name of 'family honour'.

Autopsy report had confirmed that Sana was strangled to death. Police had arrested the three suspects in the light of the autopsy report and charged them for her murder. But police failed to produce prosecution witnesses that resulted in acquittal of the suspects.

Few years ago, a British-Pakistani woman Samia Shahid was allegedly killed by her first husband and father in Punjab province for contracting second marriage with a man of different Muslim faith.

Over 1,000 women are killed in Pakistan every year in the name of honour.