The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) has strongly condemned an assistant political agent’s decision in Khyber Agency to acquit, based upon a Jirga verdict, two men who had confessed to killing their maternal uncle and their sister-in-law in a so-called honour crime.
In a statement issued on Wednesday, the commission said: “HRCP is astounded by a decision of the Landi Kotal Assistant Political Agent (APA), Khyber Agency, of acquitting two brothers charged with murdering their sister-in-law and their maternal uncle in last November and later claiming that the victims had ‘illicit relations’”.
The two brothers were arrested and in their recorded statements both had confessed to committing the murders.
A five-member jirga was appointed which concluded that the accused should be asked to take an oath on the Holy Quran that in killing their sister-in-law and their maternal uncle ‘they had done nothing wrong (with malafide intention)’. The jirga stated that if the accused took the oath the murders stood ‘justified’ as per Riwaj and the accused should be acquitted.
The Riwaj refers to a custom in the tribal areas under which killing a woman in the family after killing a man and alleging ‘illicit relations’ effectively justifies both the murders and serves as a defence against prosecution for the crime.
In finding the accused innocent, the APA wrote in his order that the jirga verdict is clear and in accordance with the local Riwaj.
