Pakistani father kills daughters before being shot dead by policeman

PAKISTAN: A Pakistan man killed his three young daughters Tuesday before confessing to police, prompting one officer to shoot him dead, an investigator said.

Mohammed Ashraf, 38, used a knife to cut the throats of his daughters aged 3, 5 and 9 before dawn in the eastern city of Lahore, said senior police investigator Amir Zulifquar.

Ashraf then went to a police station to report his crime, and was charged with murdering his daughters and placed in a cell.

"As I left the police station after questioning Mohammed Ashraf, one of my guards opened fire and killed him," Zulifquar said.

The policeman who shot Ashraf was identified as Mohammed Nadeem and was taken into custody, Zulifquar said.

Nadeem told investigators that he killed Ashraf to "eliminate an animal from society," according to Zulifquar. "A person who kills innocent children deserves no mercy," Zulifquar quoted Nadeem as saying.

Before his killing, Ashraf told police that he was jobless and had killed his daughters because of poverty, Zulifquar said.

Ashraf's wife Sughran Bibi told reporters that she didn't hear her daughters' cries and that her husband had woken her up after "committing the heinous crime for which I will never forgive him."

Nadeem, the policeman, will face court for a ruling on whether he should be charged with murder or not, Zulifquar said. No date has been set for when he will appear in court. If convicted, he faces the death penalty. Lahore,Wednesday,AP