Minute's silence to remember Shafilea Ahmed on her 33rd birthday

The Great Sankey High School pupil, who would have celebrated her 33rd birthday last Sunday, was murdered by her parents at the family home in 2003.

A National Day of Memory event is taking place in Liverpool city centre to honour the victims of such honour based violence.

Organised by charity Savera UK, it is taking place on Church Street, it will be opened at 11.30am with a minute’s silence for Shafilea after a reading of the poem Remembering Shafilea, plus speeches from Councillor Maria Toolan, Detective Superintendent Dave McCaughrean from Merseyside Police and Afrah Qassim, founder of Savera UK.

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There will be a number of activities and opportunities for discussion throughout the day, including drumming performances, poetry and positive messages read by Kiara Mohammed, a survivor of FGM and the reading of another survivor story.

A Great Sankey High School and Priestley College student, Shafilea was the victim of a brutal honour killing after her parents Farzana and Iftikhar attempted to force her to marry her cousin in Pakistan.

The family home in Great Sankey

The Ahmeds suffocated Shafilea to death by forcing a plastic bag down her throat, and she was later reported missing by her friends.

Five months later, her body washed up in the River Kent in Cumbria after severe flooding.

While police had always suspected that Iftikhar and Farzana Ahmed had killed their daughter, no evidence was found against them until Shafilea’s sister Alesha was involved in an armed robbery at their home six years later.

Farzana and Ahmed

Alesha then confessed that she had witnessed her parents choking her sister because of her choice of western clothing, which they deemed to have brought shame on the family.

In 2012, the Ahmeds were convicted of Shafilea's murder and each jailed for a minimum of 25 years.

Shafilea Ahmed