A woman was stoned to death by her own family outside one of Pakistan's top courts on Tuesday for marrying the man she loved, police said.
In a so-called "honor killing" incident, the 25-year-old and her husband were attacked with batons and bricks by nearly 20 members of the woman's family, including her father and brothers, in front of the high court of Lahore, said Naseem Butt, a police officer.
After getting engaged to Mohammad Iqbal in spite of opposition from her family, Farzana Parveen had married him, the Associated Press reported.
The couple was attending court to contest an abduction charge that Parveen's father had filed against Iqbal, her lawyer Mustafa Kharal said.
"Arranged marriages are the norm among conservative Pakistanis, who view marriage for love as a transgression," the AP reported. "Hundreds of women are killed every year in Muslim-majority Pakistan in so-called 'honor killings' carried out by husbands or relatives as a punishment for alleged adultery or other illicit sexual behavior."
Parveen's relatives waited outside the court, which is located on a main downtown thoroughfare. As the couple walked up to the court's main gate, the family members fired shots in the air and tried to snatch her from Iqbal, he said.
Parveen was beaten and pelted with bricks when she resisted her father, brothers and other relatives, Iqbal said.
Parveen, who was three-months pregnant, died while her husband managed to escape.
Police arrested Parveen's father but her brothers fled from the scene, News International reported
Iqbal, 45, said he started seeing Parveen after the death of his first wife, with whom he had five children.
"We were in love," he told The Associated Press. He alleged that the woman's family wanted to fleece money from him before marrying her off.
"I simply took her to court and registered a marriage," infuriating the family, he said.
The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, a private organization, said in a report last month that some 869 women were murdered in so-called honor killings in 2013.
