Son of tycoon beheads diplomat daughter

 The assassination of Nur Mukadam has become the most widely reported female homicide in recent history.

The son of a tycoon in Pakistan allegedly tortured a childhood friend he held captive for three days before finally beheading her.

It is about 30-year-old Zahir Jafar , who is accused of holding 27-year-old Nur Mukadam captive at his home in Islamabad, before brutally beheading her.

Hundreds of women are murdered every year in Pakistan and thousands more are victims of brutal violence, but very few cases receive constant media attention and only a small number of perpetrators are punished.

The horrific murder has sparked outrage and public outcry in Pakistan, which has already eased domestic violence laws and a poor history of protecting women from violence.

Nida Kirbani , Assistant Professor of Sociology at Lahore University of Management Sciences , said : “The status of the families involved “Islamabad elites; all of this together has undoubtedly drawn more attention to this issue.”

The assassination of Nur Mukadam has become the most widely reported female homicide in recent history. Social media was filled with angry comments as demonstrations and vigils were held in major cities, as well as by Pakistanis in the diaspora and even in distant lands such as Canada and the United States.

Local law enforcement authorities refuse to speculate on the alleged perpetrator’s motive, while his lawyer has called for a “fair trial”.

Jafar’s parents, Asmat and Zakir, were also arrested on charges of making “maximum efforts to eliminate the evidence”. Asmat and Zakir were in constant contact with their son and had “direct information” about the abduction, the judge said in a statement. In fact, they sent

psychoanalysts instead of cops to deal with their son after finding out what had happened.

Faced with public outrage, the Jaffer family published full-page newspaper articles distancing themselves from the murder and calling for justice.

Speaking to CNN, Rizwan Abbasi, a lawyer for both parents, said his clients had publicly condemned the murder.

“We are next to the affected area (and) we are not next to our son,” the statement said.

Anger in Pakistan over violence against women

The case has garnered extra attention as the Jaffer family runs one of Pakistan’s largest trading and project management companies.

Noor’s death has drawn attention to the plight of women and girls in Pakistan, where violence against them is considered a “serious problem”, according to a 2020 Human Rights Watch report on the country.

About 28% of women between the ages of 15 and 49 have been physically abused since adolescence, the Pakistani Ministry of Human Rights said.

Violence is said to occur at home and mainly between married couples, although most are not reported because it is considered a cultural norm in Pakistan’s patriarchal society, according to a report by the World Health Organization.

Activists claim that in addition to this, they also have a legal system against them, which sees the abuse as a “private affair”. There is no national law against violence against women, although some provinces have enacted their own legislation.

Life for women in Pakistan’s rural areas is markedly different from that in urban centers, especially in Islamabad, where chic cafes and malls serve a mix of wealthy intellectuals, government officials, diplomats, expatriates and foreign journalists. For many women in the country’s capital, even this image of freedom and security has been shattered.