Fakhra Younus

Fakhra Younus (فاخرہ یونس) was a Pakistani woman who was the victim of an acid attack, which severely injured her face. She committed suicide in Rome, Italy, on March 17, 2012, at the age of 33.

Younus was a dancer in a red-light district in Pakistan,^[1] when she met her future husband, Bilal Khar, the son of Ghulam Mustafa Khar, who was himself a former governor of Pakistan's largest province, Punjab. They were married for three years, with Younus eventually leaving him after she claimed he physically and verbally abused her. She further claimed that he later visited her in May 2000 and poured acid on her, in the presence of her 5-year-old son from a different man. Khar claimed that the attacker was someone else with his name. He was acquitted of all charges in the incident. The acid attack, trial, and suicide have received international attention, in relation to a high incidence of such acid attacks in Pakistan, (8,500 in 2011), and due to a documentary on the subject, Saving Face, having been awarded the nation's first Oscar less than a month prior to her suicide.^[1][2][3][4]

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