Friend tells of couple gunned down at breakfast

Gul Wazir and his wife Niaz Begum were eating breakfast when three men burst in and carried out the "revenge" attack.

A row erupted when the taxi driver was asked by his Pakistan-based brother Noor if he would allow his daughters to marry his sons Awal Zamir and Rehman.

But the daughters – who had stayed at home in Alum Rock, Birmingham – refused the proposals.

Mr Wazir was visiting relatives in Salehana, a remote village in Nowshera province, with his wife and 28-year-old son Mehboob Alam, when the approach was made.

Yesterday family friend Hassan Ahmed said Mr Wazir refused the offer because his daughters were worried about the language barrier and cultural differences.

As a result, a meeting of four village elders was called and they agreed with the Briton and his wife. Mr Wazir thought the matter was closed but on Friday three men sprayed bullets at the couple as they chatted over breakfast, Mr Ahmed said.

Their son only escaped because he was upstairs taking a shower. Hearing the gunfire, he rushed downstairs to find a bloodbath and his parents dead.

Mr Ahmed added: "This was a revenge killing. Everybody has arms on them in this particular area. It's terrible.

"I think the family are after justice now. Their mum and dad have been murdered in cold blood for no sensible reason and it is very important that the British Government puts pressure on the Pakistani police and government to do something about it."

West Midlands Police said it was investigating a threat made against one of Mr Wazir's relatives, believed to be another one of his sons, in Birmingham on Friday. Mehboob Alam has since returned to the UK, while his sisters are described as being safe.

In a similar case last May, Mohammad and Pervaze Yousaf, from Nelson, Lancashire, were gunned down in a graveyard in north-east Pakistan after the arranged marriage of their son Kamar to his cousin broke down.