Fawziyah Javed was 17 weeks pregnant when her husband killed her. Her mother tells RT why she wanted his murder trial shown on TV
The Push: Murder on the Cliff
Sunday, Monday 9.00pm C4
FAWZIYAH JAVED WAS 17 weeks pregnant with her first child when she was murdered on 2 September 2021. A “beautiful soul” with a contagious laugh, the lawyer was pushed off Arthur’s Seat in Edinburgh by her husband two days before her 32nd birthday and fell 50ft to her death.
Today, her mother Yasmin is broken by the death of her only child. The notion that the passing of time could one day soften her pain is proving cruel and false. “It’s getting harder and harder,” she says, tears falling.
Talking about Fawziyah is difficult, but Yasmin wants to tell her daughter’s story to highlight the blight of domestic violence, hidden behind so many front doors across Britain. “If I can tell people how much this has destroyed me and my family’s life, his actions – it can make a difference,” she says. “If it can happen to Fawziyah, it can happen to anyone.”
Fawziyah “was very clever, very articulate, independent and strong. She knew her rights as a woman.” And, Yasmin adds, “she helped convict him”. Shortly before she died among gorse bushes on the Edinburgh beauty spot while on a mini-break with her husband, Kashif Anwar, Fawziyah told a female police officer what had happened. “He pushed me,” she said, because she’d tried to end her relationship with him. In pain, with multiple injuries, she asked whether she was going to die, whether her baby was going to die, and why Anwar had treated her the way that he did.
Anwar, 29, an optical assistant from Pudsey near Leeds, claimed he had slipped and bumped into his wife after taking a selfie, causing her to fall, but in April 2023 he was found guilty of murdering Fawziyah and causing the death of her unborn child. His trial at the High Court in Edinburgh was filmed, with Fawziyah’s family’s support, for Channel 4’s two-part documentary, The Push: Murder on the Cliff.
Despite Anwar being sentenced to a minimum of 20 years behind bars, Yasmin says it’s her family in Leeds who are serving the real life sentence. “He’s in prison, but he’s still alive. He’s living, breathing and allowed phone calls and visitors. We’re the ones with the real life sentence. We’ll be in pain and grief and in darkness until our last breath.”
Anwar’s abusive nature wasn’t obvious at first. He and Fawziyah first met when she accompanied her mother to an appointment to buy new glasses.
