Islamabad: The Pakistani men took turns savagely beating the two teenage brothers with sticks, drawing blood before dragging and hanging their dead bodies from a nearby metal pole.
None of the dozens of people watching tried to stop the attack, not even several police. The boys may have been mistaken for robbers.
The scene, caught on video and broadcast on news channels, has outraged and anguished Pakistanis, some of whom are asking if years of state neglect have brutalized society.
It also is a blow to the already-shoddy image of the government as it appeals for international aid to cope with disastrous floods.
"Is this what we are? Savages?" asked an editorial in The News, an English-language daily. "So utterly bereft of a speck of humanity that a crowd of ordinary men are passive spectators to public murder?"
The killings of Moiz Butt, 17, and his brother Muneeb, 15, occurred August 15 in Sialkot, a town in eastern Punjab province. As details have emerged, authorities appear increasingly confident that the two boys were innocent.
The two went to play cricket after praying and eating breakfast, carrying a bag with them containing game equipment, said Mujahid Sherdil, a top government official in the district.
They were sons of a middle-class man who deals in fabric for soccer balls. Moiz was honoured with the title "hafiz" for having memorised the Muslim holy book, the Quran.
An armed robbery had taken place in the vicinity of the cricket field, so residents were on alert and police were nearby.
Apparently, when the boys appeared with a bag, they were thought to be the robbers, Sherdil told The Associated Press.
He added, however, that more information was still being sought. The boys were believed to have been in fights over the past few days for the right to play on the cricket ground.
The origins of the video are unknown and there are reports that multiple men in the crowd recorded the attack using cell phones.
Stations blurred out some of the more graphic images of the boys' bloodied bodies, but several faces in the crowd are clearly identifiable, including several police officers in uniform who watched.
Civic groups condemned the attack in Sialkot, and the media attention has forced the government to respond.
Federal Interior Minister Rehman Malik visited the family of the two victims Sunday in Sialkot and issued an appeal for citizens to come forward with evidence to help the investigation. He said at least 10 suspects have been arrested, including four police officers.
Malik said the police should have at least fired their guns in the air to disperse the crowd, and added that people should not take the law into their own hands.
"It is not the kind of incident any civilized society can afford," he said. "The whole of Pakistan wants the people involved to be punished. And we are getting demands from the nation that they should be hanged at the very place where they murdered the two brothers."
