Father and daughter killed in arson attack in Algeria over rejected marriage proposal

Dubai: The normally quiet neighbourhood of “500 Raoui Mohamed” in Algeria’s Tissemsilt province has been rocked by a horrific crime in which an 18-year-old woman and her father were killed in a fire that authorities say was deliberately set after the family rejected a marriage proposal.

Witnesses told local reporters that the suspect, a man in his 20s, had previously sought to marry an 18-year-old woman. When she and her father refused, he allegedly threatened them, saying: “I swear I will burn you.”

Two days later, police said, the man returned at night with three accomplices. Climbing onto the family’s roof, they allegedly doused the victims — and even the suspect himself — with gasoline before setting the house on fire. The blaze quickly spread, trapping the family inside.

The injured were rushed to a hospital in Tissemsilt for emergency care and later transferred to the specialist burns unit in Zeralda, near Algiers.

The father and daughter succumbed to their injuries shortly afterwards, while another family member remains under close medical supervision.