Samaa TV presenter Kiran Naz goes on air with her daughter

NEW DELHI: An anchor at a Pakistani news channel delivered a powerful statement when she did a live telecast on Wednesday with her young daughter sitting in her lap.

During a news bulletin, Samaa TV presenter Kiran Naz made a point about how she felt as a mother in the aftermath of the brutal rape and murder of a minor girl in eastern Pakistan 's Kasur town.

"Today I'm not your host Kiran Naz. I'm a mother and that is why I'm sitting here with my daughter," a visibly emotional Naz said on national television.

Naz, reportedly one of the most popular female anchors in Pakistan, then voiced an impassioned monologue on the events following the abduction, rape and killing of seven-year-old Zainab Ansari .

"It is said that the smaller the corpse, the heavier it feels. Today, a tiny corpse is lying on the streets of Kasur and the entire Pakistan is crushed under its weight... This day marks the funeral of humanity," she said.

Slamming the rigmarole of police investigation and political wrangling over such cases, Naz asserted that what should take precedence is ensuring justice for Zainab and punishment to the perpetrators.

Zainab Ansari disappeared last week while going to a nearby home for Quranic studies and her body was found in a Kasur waste-yard on Tuesday.

Her murder ignited fury in Kasur, where residents attacked a police station. After failing to disperse the mob, police opened fire. Two people were killed and three others were wounded in the ensuing clashes.

Zainab's parents, who were away on a pilgrimage at the time she went missing, blamed the police for their slow response.

Police in Kasur denied they have been lax in investigating child abductions in the town. Regional police officer Zulfiqar Hameed told Reuters that arrests had been made and the case of Zainab would soon be solved.

(With inputs from Agencies)

