Pakistani Religious Council Issues Edict Against Honor Killings

Farzana Parveen's sister Khalida holds up a picture of Farzana during a press conference in Lahore on May 31.

Some 50 religious scholars from the nongovernmental Pakistan Ulema Council have met and issued an edict against so-called "honor killings."

The chairman of the Ulema Council, Hafiz Tahir Ashrafi, told RFE/RL on June 6 that "anyone killing a woman in the name of honor is committing three crimes -- defamation of Islam, defamation of the country, and spreading disorder on Earth."

The June 5 edict from the council came in response to the killing of 25-year-old Farzana Parveen by her relatives in front of a Lahore courthouse on May 27.

Parveen, three months' pregnant, was stoned to death for rejecting the arranged suitor her family had chosen and marrying a man she loved.

On June 1, some 30 clerics of the Sunni Ittehad (Unity) Council in Lahore announced that honor killings are prohibited by Islam.