TWO of Scotland's biggest political heavyweights have been urged to help solve the mystery death of a Scottish mother in Pakistan.
First Minister Alex Salmond and former Labour MP turned Punjab governor Mohammed Sarwar have been asked to intervene in the case of Mumtaz Sattar. She is thought to have died after drinking spiked tea early on Saturday.
Friends and family in Scotland fear the 38-year-old from Glasgow, who has daughters aged 10 and 13, was deliberately poisoned during a suspected robbery.
Mrs Sattar and her husband Abdul drank the tea during a night-time taxi-ride from Lahore Airport to visit relatives. Then according to Mr Sattar, who survived, they fell unconscious and were dumped at the roadside and their cash and passports were taken.
But Aamer Anwar, their solicitor, asked both Mr Salmond and Mr Sarwar for urgent help answering a series of questions about the incident.
In a letter to the First Minister, he said: "The Foreign Office has offered little by way of consular assistance and we would request as a matter of urgency that the murder is treated as a matter of priority.
"I hope the First Minister's Office can contact the authorities in Pakistan to highlight our concerns. Clearly Mr Abdul Sattar is a critical witness to the murder and I am requesting Scottish police provide whatever assistance is required to the Pakistani authorities.
"I have already arranged for the CID to interview Mumtaz's sisters in Glasgow as they may hold important information."
The Sattars arrived in Lahore at 1am on Monday. They then took a taxi from outside the secure perimeter of the airport with two apparent strangers.
Mr Anwar said Mrs Sattar's family were "at a loss to understand why such a dangerous step was taken" and wanted help from Scottish experts to view airport CCTV and use face recognition software to figure out who was with the couple.
The solicitor also said the family were eager to see any toxicology reports carried out on both Mr and Mrs Sattar, and wanted any samples kept for further checks in Scotland.
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