Qandeel’s family barred from forgiving son

Muhammad Waseem drugged and strangled Qandeel Baloch on Friday in a murder that has shocked Pakistan, a deeply conservative Muslim nation where the 26-year-old both titillated and outraged with her risqué social media photos and videos. 

Waseem told media he had ‘no regrets’ about killing his sister as she violated the family’s honour by her social media pictures, including ‘selfie’ photographs with prominent Muslim cleric Abdul Qavi. In a video post with Qavi, she appears to sit on his lap. 

More than 500 people, almost all of them women, die in honour killings in Pakistan every year, usually at the hands of relatives acting over a perception that shame has been brought on the family. 

An anti-honour killings bill that aims to close the family forgiveness loophole has been bogged down in parliament.