INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
prayers Sunday at the funeral service for a 17-year-old Pakistani exchange student killed in a mass shooting at her southeast Texas high
school.About 1,000 people, many with Pakistani roots and wearing traditional Muslim dress, converged on an Islamic center in Stafford to
honor Sabika Sheikh, whose body was brought by hearse to the somber service from Santa Fe, the nearby small rural town where a student
Her mother is in denial right now," Shaheera al-Basid, a graduate student in the US capital Washington, told AFP at the funeral
Americans."I came here just like her, as a student," he recalled
"God forbid that could have happened to me when I was here
As a parent, it is just devastating."Samad also addressed the painful irony that a young woman from a country that many Americans associated
with the war on terror in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001 attacks on New York and Washington was killed in a country that millions
around the world see as a bastion of freedom.The attacks were a "tragedy, and tragedy sometimes teaches you life," he said
"But it also revisits, and in this case very close to here."Several Pakistani-American youths also attended the funeral service, including
Danyal Zakaria of nearby Sugar Land, Texas.The 17-year-old said it was "truly mind-blowing" that an exchange student his age could be cut
down in cold blood at a US school."This nation is known to be safe," he said
"If America is not safe, then where is"
