Pakistani village council orders five women to be raped or killed

From The Telegraph:

A village council in Pakistan has decreed that five young women should be abducted, raped or killed for refusing to honour childhood “marriages”.
The women, who are cousins, were married in absentia by a mullah in their Punjabi village to illiterate sons of their family’s enemies in 1996, when they were aged from six to 13.
The marriages were part of a compensation agreement ordered by the village council and reached at gunpoint after the father of one of the girls shot dead a family rival.
The rival families have now called in their “debt”, demanding the marriages to the village men are fulfilled.

Thankfully, the young women’s fathers are supporting them and are refusing to marry their daughters off. But the case is becoming increasingly controversial and violent–two people have been shot and 20 arrested in related incidents.
Not only have the young women been sentenced, but Jehan Khan Niazi–the father of three of the women–has been sentenced to death for refusing to produce his daughters for marriage.
Niazi said, “I have refused to give into the council’s request as it is un-Islamic. I cannot hand over my girls like goats…”
Niazi’s daughters–who are are all in school, the oldest in college–say they will kill themselves if forced to marry.