What was supposed to be a family visit to Pakistan ended in tragedy for nine-year-old Australian girl Hania Ahmed, whose father is now demanding justice after she was killed during a police shooting in Punjab province.According to a report by The Guardian, Hania and her family were visiting relatives in Chakwal in Punjab when armed robbers confronted them outside their great uncle Ali Ejaz’s house late on Wednesday night, and demanded cash, jewellery, and other valuables.Ijaz said that Hania’s father, Adel Ahmed, her mother and her brother, Affan, pleaded with the thieves, saying: “Don’t hurt my family,” before agreeing to hand over their belongings.Moments later, the situation got out of control.Just before midnight, officers from the newly formed Anti-Crime Department of Punjab Police arrived at the scene. CCTV footage reviewed by The Guardian reportedly showed officers opening fire with machine guns as the robbers and the family tried to escape.An eyewitness, who requested to remain anonymous, recalled the chaos that followed.They said: “I could see the car speeding up and the police officer shooting directly at the car.”
“Then two CCD officials stopped a passerby’s motorcycle, sat on it and three or four other police personnel followed in a car and chased the family car.”Haniyeh, who was caught in the crossfire, was hit by four bullets and died before arriving at the hospital. Her father, 39-year-old Adel Ahmed, was reportedly hit by two bullets but escaped serious injury. Her 11-year-old brother, Affan, was also injured twice and is recovering at Benazir Bhutto Hospital in Rawalpindi.The loss has devastated a family who had recently completed the annual Hajj pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia and were preparing to return to Australia on Monday.“The incident has shattered the family and people in the area,” Ejaz said, reflecting the grief that has spread among the local community and relatives abroad.Images of the family’s bloodstained car, riddled with bullet holes, quickly spread on social media, sparking anger at the police response.Punjab Police later said that one of the officers “wrongly estimated that the suspects were trying to flee in the victims’ vehicle and discharged his weapon.” The officer was suspended, arrested, and transferred to judicial custody, where the authorities promised to conduct a “comprehensive and impartial investigation.”Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese also called for a “transparent and proper” investigation.Friends and relatives say Adeel Ahmed is still in shock, struggling to come to terms with his daughter’s death.
He said in a recorded message that those responsible must be punished “so that this incident is not repeated and the risks of the Convention to Combat Desertification are reduced.”“It was started by CCD,” Ahmed said. “The robbers did not start shooting first. They just fired in retaliation.”“There were at least four CCD officials and they should be charged,” he added.CCD chief Sohail Zafar Chatta confirmed that the robbers fired first, but acknowledged that the officers should not have continued firing without confirming the identity of who was inside the fleeing car.“The continued firing by CCD officials without proof of their identity was a serious violation of CCD rules,” he said. “We have registered a case and the family has expressed confidence in the investigation.”The incident also sparked scrutiny of the CCD, a specialist police unit set up last year to tackle serious crime. The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan called for a judicial investigation into hundreds of killings linked to the administration, alleging that it adopted confrontational killings as a “political matter.”“We have a very polarized political society in the country, and this is because of politics, and we are facing criticism,” Chatta said, dismissing the criticism.However, for Hania’s family, the focus remains on the young lives that ended, and the search for answers as to how a robbery turned into a fatal police shooting.