Daily Times

RAWALPINDI: Commander United States Central Command General Joseph Votel extended his condolences over the tragic death of Sabika Sheikh in a call to Chief of Army Staff General Qamar Javed Bajwa on Tuesday, Tweeted Inter Services Public Relations Director General Major General Asif Ghafoor.

Sabika Sheikh, a Pakistani exchange student studying in the US facilitated by the Kennedy-Lugar Youth Exchange and Study (YES) programme along with 10 classmates was killed when a teenage classmate armed with a shotgun and a revolver opened fire in a Texas high school.

The Tweet added that General Votel conveyed his grief to the bereaved family on loss of an innocent life.

The gunman – arrested on murder charges – was identified as Dimitrios Pagourtzis, a 17-year-old junior at Santa Fe High School. He was being held on capital murder charges, meaning that he could face the death penalty.

The body of Sabika Sheikh will arrive in Karachi today (Wednesday).

On Sunday, the funeral prayers for Sabika were offered at a local mosque in Houston after Zuhr prayers.

The funeral service was scheduled by the Pakistani Consulate in Houston at Sugar Land’s Masjid Sabireen.

Hundreds of people, including grief-stricken families of southwestern Texas, gathered to join the funeral, including officials of the Pakistani Consulate in Houston, local members of the United States Congress, members of the Pakistani diaspora and students of Santa Fe High School.

While talking to the media in Karachi, Jalil Sheikh said Sabika’s body will arrive from the United States at 4am since the Turkish Airlines flight carrying it was delayed due to bad weather. Her body was earlier scheduled to arrive at 9am on Tuesday.

He said that her funeral prayers will be held at 9am at Gulshan-i-Iqbal’s Hakeem Saeed Ground, following which she will be buried in the Azeempura graveyard in Shah Faisal Colony. He added that Hakeem Saeed Ground had been chosen because a large number of people wanted to attend her last rites.

Sabika’s uncle said his family is in contact with Pakistani diplomats as well as local administration.

At the memorial, Sabika’s host family in the US, the Cogburns, had spoken fondly of her time with them in Texas, remembering her as a “daughter”, a “most precious gift”, great ambassador of Pakistan and a deeply loving person.

“We loved her and we hate this horrific thing happened,” Jason Cogburn, one of the members of her host family, said at the service. “We are going to carry on the tradition of love she brought from Pakistan.”

“She came here to represent Pakistan, and let me tell you, she represented it well. She will be very missed and she will always be loved.”

Published in Daily Times, May 23^rd 2018.