Police in Pakistan’s capital Islamabad have arrested a person accused of murdering a 17-year-old social media influencer, Sana Yousaf.
Yousaf, who had a whole bunch of 1000’s of followers on TikTok and Instagram, was shot lifeless at her house on Monday, the most recent high-profile occasion of suspected femicide in Pakistan.
What occurred to Sana Yousaf?
Native media reported that Yousaf was shot lifeless at her house in Islamabad at about 5pm (12:00 GMT), in keeping with a police report filed by Yousaf’s mom, Farzana Yousaf, seen by Pakistani information outlet, Daybreak.
The report added that Yousaf was shot twice in her chest and was taken to a hospital however died of her accidents.
Who was Sana Yousaf?
Yousaf was a social media influencer, initially from Chitral, a metropolis about 400km (250 miles) north of Islamabad.
As of Wednesday, her TikTok account had 1.1 million followers. She usually posted movies of herself lip syncing to songs. The final video posted on her account is a montage of her celebrating her birthday together with her pals.
On Tuesday, Yousaf was buried in her ancestral graveyard in Chitral’s Chuinj village, in keeping with Daybreak.
What do we all know concerning the homicide suspect?
On Tuesday, Syed Ali Nasir Rizvi, Islamabad’s inspector basic of police (IGP), advised a media briefing that the police had arrested a suspect from Faisalabad, a metropolis about 320km (200 miles) south of Islamabad, inside 20 hours of the homicide.
“The accused is a 22-year-old unemployed man who repeatedly tried to contact the sufferer. Upon her refusal to reply, he dedicated the homicide,” stated Rizvi.
He added that the suspect took Yousaf’s cellphone with him to “destroy proof”, however that police had seized her cellphone in addition to the homicide weapon from the suspect.
Daybreak reported, quoting unnamed sources near the investigation, that the suspect and Yousaf had recognized one another for one 12 months. The suspect had travelled to Islamabad between Might 28 and 29 to want Yousaf effectively on her birthday, however the two couldn’t meet, for unspecified causes.
The suspect and Yousaf then spoke by cellphone and determined to satisfy on June 2. When the suspect reached Yousaf’s home, she didn’t come out. Nonetheless, he nonetheless managed to enter and an argument ensued, escalating into Yousaf’s homicide.
Yousaf’s dad and mom weren’t at house when the homicide befell, however her aunt was current.
What are the reactions to Yousaf’s homicide?
The Nationwide Fee on the Standing of Ladies (NCSW), a statutory physique established to look at authorities insurance policies affecting girls, has demanded an in depth investigation into the crime.
“We is not going to let this case be buried beneath social stigma, false narratives of honour, or procedural loopholes. This mindless killing highlights the vulnerability of ladies and ladies, even in their very own houses. We demand justice for Sana and her household, and anticipate the state to make sure accountability of the perpetrators,” stated NCSW chairperson Ume Laila Azhar.
Pakistan’s Inside Minister Mohsin Naqvi confirmed the suspect’s arrest in an X put up on Tuesday. “Police has recovered the pistol and the i cellphone [iPhone] of the deceased woman and accused has confessed the homicide as effectively,” he wrote. Al Jazeera has not been in a position to independently affirm whether or not the suspect has confessed to killing Yousaf.
Effectively Completed Islamabad Police. Sana Yousaf homicide case traced, accused arrested and weapon recovered inside 20 hours
The incident occurred yesterday in Islamabad when a younger woman was murdered by a masked accused. The accused has been arrested simply an hour again. Police has… pic.twitter.com/jmQx9xAlhm
— Mohsin Naqvi (@MohsinnaqviC42) June 3, 2025
Aurat March, the feminist group which organises Pakistan’s largest annual girls’s march in a number of cities – normally coinciding with Worldwide Ladies’s Day on March 8 – posted a press release on Tuesday. “We, the Aurat March chapters throughout the nation, demand justice for Sana a 17-year-old woman and TikToker who tragically misplaced her life to patriarchal violence,” the account wrote within the caption.
“Patriarchy feels most threatened when girls & gender minorities declare voice and visibility in public by difficult the stand pat norms. In response, it turns to violence the last word instrument to silence, management, and erase.
“That is precisely what occurred to Sana who was killed inside her own residence by a violent man who couldn’t take no for a solution. This wasn’t a random hit, this was a deliberate assault the place a minor woman’s privateness and residential had been invaded by a person who thought he would get away with it.”
That is precisely what occurred to Sana who was killed inside her own residence by a violent man who couldn’t take no for a solution. This wasn’t a random hit, this was a deliberate assault the place a minor woman’s privateness and residential had been invaded by a person who thought he would get away with it. pic.twitter.com/aUOrJL3koE
— Aurat March – عورت مارچ (@AuratMarchKHI) June 3, 2025
Actor Mahira Khan additionally posted a narrative on Instagram, sharing the information of Yousaf’s homicide. “Disgusted to the core,” Khan wrote within the caption.
How frequent is an incident like this in Pakistan?
Lately, a number of incidents have occurred involving younger girls being topic to violent crimes by the hands of males they know. Many of those girls additionally had a social media presence on platforms corresponding to TikTok.
“Sana Yousaf’s homicide is a part of a horrifying, ongoing sample of violence in opposition to girls in Pakistan, particularly those that dare to exist with autonomy,” Nighat Dad, the chief director of a nongovernmental, research-based advocacy organisation, Digital Rights Basis, advised Al Jazeera. “These will not be remoted incidents. What connects them is a tradition the place girls are punished for visibility, independence, and saying no.
“On the coronary heart of this sample is fragile masculinity and deeply rooted misogyny. When younger girls assert boundaries or say no to romantic or sexual advances, it bruises the male ego, particularly in a society that teaches males entitlement over girls’s our bodies and decisions. This entitlement, when left unchecked by regulation, tradition, and platforms, turns lethal,” Dad added.
On January 28, a person named Anwar ul-Haq was charged with homicide after he confessed to taking pictures his 14-year-old daughter Hira Anwar in Quetta, a metropolis in Pakistan’s southwest. The person, who had lately moved his household again to Pakistan from the US, advised the police he discovered TikTok movies made by his daughter “objectionable”. His daughter had been posting movies to the social platform earlier than she had moved to Pakistan together with her household.
In October 2024, police in Pakistan’s southern metropolis Karachi stated that they had arrested a person for killing 4 members of his household. The 4 girls, aged 60, 21, 20, 20 and 12 had been discovered with slit throats in separate rooms of their house, in keeping with the police.
In 2022, Pakistani American girl Sania Khan was 29 when she was shot and killed by her former husband, Raheel Ahmad, in Chicago after she had posted about her divorce on her TikTok account. When the police arrived, Ahmad, 36 on the time, shot himself with the gun he used to kill Khan.
Probably probably the most high-profile homicide case of a Pakistani girl befell in 2016, when social media star Qandeel Baloch was killed by her brother when she was 26 years outdated.
“Ladies who’re seen on-line, notably those that problem social norms or exist exterior the mould of respectability politics, face disproportionate abuse and threats,” Dad stated. “The backlash isn’t simply digital, it’s bodily. When platforms fail to behave in opposition to hate and harassment, they permit a tradition the place violence turns into the consequence of ladies merely being seen and heard.”
In all, 346 girls in Pakistan had been killed in 2024 within the title of “honour”, up from 324 in 2023, in keeping with the Human Rights Fee of Pakistan (HRCP).
However this statistic possible doesn’t embody instances like Yousaf’s, the place the accused man just isn’t from the sufferer’s household and dedicated homicide after his advances had been rejected.
In July 2021, 27-year-old Noor Mukadam was killed in Islamabad by Zahir Jaffar, whose household was recognized to Mukadam’s. In 2022, a decide sentenced Jaffar to loss of life for the rape, homicide and beheading of Mukadam. Final week, Pakistan’s Supreme Courtroom upheld Jaffar’s loss of life penalty.
“We want systemic change. The state should deal with on-line misogyny and gender-based violence as related threats and never separate points,” Dad stated. “When a girl says no, and a person responds with violence, that’s not heartbreak, it’s abuse.”
