Anthony Albanese fronts Pakistan PM as autopsy reveals Perth girl sprayed with bullets in police take-down

Anthony Albanese will personally raise the case of a Perth girl gunned down by police in Pakistan with that country’s Prime Minister as he continues his call for “transparency” around her death. Punjab Police fired at the hire car that nine-year-old Hania Ahmed was in after mistaking the Toyota as the vehicle being driven by the thieves who had held her family at gunpoint just moments earlier. Her father Adeel Ahmed, 39, and 11-year-old brother Aafan were seriously injured in the incident, while his wife Dr Sidra Khan was unharmed. The Prime Minister has described the incident in the Chakwal region on June 10 as “dire”, and after publicly calling for a “proper investigation” on Wednesday, will write a letter to his counterpart, Shehbaz Sharif. It comes after Foreign Minister Penny Wong has also raised the case with Pakistan’s Foreign Minister, Ishaq Dar. According to local media outlet Dawn, an autopsy conducted at the District Headquarters Hospital confirmed Hania sustained 10 gunshot wounds. “She was hit by five bullets, which appeared to have been fired from AK-47 rifles. The five bullets caused 10 wounds, as all of them passed through her body, leaving both entry and exit wounds,” a senior doctor at DHQ Hospital told Dawn. Pakistani authorities later acknowledged the family were not connected to any criminal activity and expressed their “sorrow” for wrongly identifying the car. In a lengthy public statement, local police confirmed the officer has been suspended, arrested and remanded in custody. However, authorities and the family have disputed who fired the first shots after her father claimed Punjab’s Crime Control Department fired before the robbers. Local authorities acknowledged their operation failures at a press conference on Tuesday, local time, where they insisted the “robbers shot first”. “We believe the officer in this case was fired upon. The firing needs to be in self-defence,” they stated. The family had been on holidays and visiting relatives when two men on motorcycles had robbed them at gunpoint. The chief of the Punjab’s crime control department Sohail Zafar Chattha told a press conference in Pakistan on Thursday that the Chakwal incident was a matter of “deep sorrow for all of us”. The top official had visited relatives of the family after the shooting and vowed to be transparent to the family in their investigation. Punjab police have said publicly there was “absolutely no justification for deviating from our established protocols” and that it was conducting a “thorough and impartial investigation”. In Perth, Australian Islamic College executive principal Abdullah Khan said the school would consider whether to hold an event to commemorate Hania’s life after her parents and brother return to WA. “We are holding off any event until the family is back — we will organise in consultation with the family,” he said. Mr Khan said Hania’s brother was still in hospital recovering from his wounds. He hoped the family might be back in time for the start of Term 3 on July 20. “They are trying to cope, obviously it’s a very difficult time for them,” he said. Australian officials are calling for a transparent investigation into the shooting. A DFAT spokesman said they were continuing to support the family. “DFAT officials are in contact with Pakistani authorities who are investigating the matter and have relayed our expectation that it be examined thoroughly,” he said.