The UK police have charged 10-year-old Sara Sharif’s father Irfan Sharif, stepmother Beinash Batool and uncle Faisal with murder.
The trio were arrested on their return from Pakistan yesterday and have been charged with the murder of Sara Sharif.
According to authorities, the three were arrested at Gatwick Airport.
Two days back, all three of them flew back to the UK as law enforcing agencies in Pakistan kept pursuing them.
Raja Haq Nawaz, a lawyer for Urfan Sharif’s father Muhammad Sharif, told DAWN that the suspects were not arrested and that their flight left from Sialkot, Punjab.
Previously, Jhelum police shifted Urfan Sharif’s five children to the Child Protection Bureau after a local court granted permission to the police to do so. The children were to be in the Bureau’s custody till the parents were found and arrested.
While they were in Pakistan, the couple also released a video in which Batool touched upon media reporting of Sara’s death, claiming that they both will cooperate with UK authorities, and that they were on the run in Pakistan because the family feared that the Pakistan police will torture and kill them.
The Case
On August 10, 10-year-old Sara Sharif was found dead in her home in Woking, England, when her father, Urfan Sharif, called 999 from Pakistan.
Nadeem Riaz, shop owner and a travelling agent, has known Sharif for 11 years.
During an interview with The Times, he recalled that on August 8, he booked a one-way tickets to Pakistan on urgent basis, claiming that his cousin died.
On August 9, Sharif, his wife Beinash Batool, their five children and Sharif’s brother Faisal Malik left for Islamabad from the UK on a British Airways flight.
The next day, Urfan Sharif called 999 after which the police found Sara’s body at home. Surrey Police then began an investigation along with international partners. The same day, after arriving at Islamabad, the family travelled to Jhelum. The police kept on tracking them as they left for Domeli late on August 12, and then left Domeli the very next day. This was the last location tracked.
On August 15, Pakistan police received a request from International Criminal Police Organization (Interpol) via FIA to hunt them down.
