December 07, 2006	Thursday	Ziqa'ad 15, 1427

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ISLAMABAD, Dec 6: The government has made a Pakistan origin French national surrender to the law and face trial for setting ablaze a girl in France. Interior Minister Aftab Ahmad Khan Sherpao touched on Amer Butt case in a brief speech at a ceremony held at the residence of French ambassador to Pakistan. However, he avoided explaining the nature of the case even during a chat with newsmen after the ceremony. “It would have been better if I had not touched this subject,” the minister said.

Sources in the French embassy, however, told this reporter that Amer Butt had set on fire a Moroccan Muslim girl in the suburbs of Paris in November 2005 for not marrying him and fled to Pakistan in his native village close to Gujrat.

The French government kept on urging the Government of Pakistan to arrest him and accused the Interior Ministry of not showing interest in the case.

The sources said the victim was burnt 70 per cent and a case was registered against Amer Butt. The Moroccan lady was member of a powerful lobby group advocating for the rights of women.

They said the French government mounted pressure on Amer Butt’s family members in France, while the law-enforcement agencies of Pakistan also helped a lot in making him surrender to the law.

Ultimately, Amer Butt travelled to France on November 17 and was arrested at the airport on the basis of information passed on to the French authorities by the Pakistani law-enforcement agencies. Amer Butt is being tried under the French law.