A popular female Pakistani singer who defied the Taliban's decree against
singing and dancing was shot and killed in northwest Pakistan Monday night.
Ghazala Javed & her Father dead bodies
Ghazala Javed Last View before burrial
Ghazala Javed Dead Body in Hospital at Peshawar
Last Journey
Authorities described the
singer's ex-husband as a suspect in the case, and said early indications were
that the Taliban were not involved, according to police official Imtiaz
Altaf.
Shamshad TV Afghanistan interview with Ghazal Javed in 2010
Ghazala Javed, who recorded
scores of songs in her native Pashto language and became a household name among
young, progressive ethnic Pashtuns in northwest Pakistan, had just left a beauty
salon and was driving home with her father when gunmen on a motorcycle raced
towards their car and sprayed it with bullets, Altaf said.
Javed was hit with six bullets
and pronounced dead at a hospital in Peshawar, the capital of Pakistan's
Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province, according to hospital official Rahim Afridi.
Javed's father also was killed, police said.
In recent years the rise of the
Pakistani Taliban in the region and the group's ban against singing and dancing
made it difficult for Javed and other musical artists to perform and record
songs in Pakistan. Javed recorded and taped many of her latest songs and music
videos in nearby Dubai.
Last year Javed made headlines
when she asked for a divorce from her husband after she reportedly found out
that he had at least one other wife. It was a rare decision in a deeply
conservative and male-dominated society where many view a woman's demand for a
divorce as a dishonor to the husband.
Shortly after Monday night's
shooting police released a statement saying Javed's sister had accused her
ex-husband and two of his acquaintances
Investigators said a search was
underway for the three men.
Other File Photos
