A family trip to Pakistan ended in tragedy for nine-year-old Australian girl Haniya Ahmed, whose father is now demanding justice after her death during a police shootout in Punjab province.According to a report in The Guardian, Hania and her family were visiting relatives in Chakwal, Punjab, when armed robbers confronted them outside her uncle Ali Ijaz’s house late on Wednesday night and demanded cash, jewelery and other valuables.Ijaz said that Haniya’s father Adeel Ahmed, her mother and her brother Afan pleaded with the robbers and told them, “Don’t harm my family”, before they agreed to hand over their belongings.After some time the situation went out of control.Shortly before midnight, officials from the newly formed Crime Control Department (CCD) of Punjab Police reached the spot. CCTV footage reviewed by The Guardian reportedly showed officers opening fire with machine guns as the robbers and the family attempted to flee.An eyewitness, who requested anonymity, recalled the chaos that followed the incident.“I could see the car speeding away and the police officer was shooting straight at the car,” he said. “Then two CCD officers stopped the motorcycle of a passerby, sat on it and chased the family car with three or four more police personnel in a car.”Hania, who was caught in the crossfire, was hit by four bullets and died before reaching the hospital. Her father, 39-year-old Adeel Ahmed, was reportedly shot twice but escaped serious injury. His 11-year-old brother Afan was also hit twice and is recovering at Benazir Bhutto Hospital in Rawalpindi.The damage has devastated a family that had recently completed the annual Hajj pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia and were preparing to return to Australia on Monday.“This incident has devastated the family and the people of the region,” Ijaz said, reflecting the widespread grief both among the local community and relatives abroad.Images of the family’s bloodied car, riddled with bullet holes, quickly circulated on social media, sparking outrage over the police response.Punjab Police later said that an officer “mistakenly assumed that the suspects were attempting to flee in the victims’ vehicle and discharged his weapon”. The officer was suspended, arrested and remanded to judicial custody as authorities promised a “thorough, impartial investigation.”Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has also called for a “transparent and fair” investigation.Friends and relatives say Adeel Ahmed is in shock and struggling to cope with his daughter’s death. In a recorded message he said that those responsible should be punished so that this incident does not happen again and the dangers of CCD are reduced.“It was initiated by the CCD. The thieves did not start firing first. They only fired in retaliation,” Ahmed said.“There were at least four CCD officers and they should be charged,” he said.CCD chief Sohail Zafar Chatta said the robbers opened fire first, but admitted that officers should not have continued firing without confirming who was inside the fleeing vehicle.“Continuation of firing by CCD officers without positive identification was a serious violation of CCD rules,” he said. “We have registered a case and the family has expressed confidence in the investigation.”The incident has also sparked renewed scrutiny of the CCD, a special police unit created last year to tackle serious crime. The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan has demanded a judicial inquiry into hundreds of killings linked to the department, alleging that it has treated encounter killings “as a matter of policy”.Rejecting the criticism, Chatta said, “We have a highly polarized political society in our country and it is because of politics that we are facing criticism.”However, Haniya’s family remains focused on a young life cut short and the search for answers as to how a robbery turned into a fatal police shooting.