Mum-of-three’s body discovered 12 years after she was...

Police have found human remains during a fresh search for Rania Alayed, who was murdered by her husband 12 years ago. Ms Alayed was 25 when she was murdered in an ‘honour killing’ by husband Ahmed Al-Khatib at a flat in Gorton, Salford, in July 2013.

Image Credit: Metro [Police and forensics officers are carrying out searches, near the A19, for murdered mum-of-three, Rania Alayed (PICTURED). On Monday 24 February, officers from Greater Manchester Police began ?carrying out a detailed search in relation to recovering the body of Rania Alayed?, pictured in North Yorks, February 26, 2025. Release date ? February 26, 2025. Police officers from Manchester Police are carrying out searches near the A19 for a murdered mum-of-three. Rania Alayed had previously lived on Teesside and was just 25 when she was killed by her estranged husband Ahmed Al-Khatib in June 2013. He murdered the young mum at his brother's flat in Salford, before attempting to convince her family and friends that she was still alive. Al-Khatib said he had buried her in a copse between trees near the A19 in Thirsk, North Yorkshire, but her body has never been found. On Monday 24 February, officers from Greater Manchester Police began ?carrying out a detailed search in relation to recovering the body of Rania Alayed?. The force confirmed that they have acted on information available to them, and are now looking at a further section of layby on the A19 Thirsk.]

Al-Khatib was found guilty of her murder and was jailed for life in 2014, but despite several searches by police Ms Alayed’s body never found. However, yesterday Greater Manchester Police located buried remains by the A19 in Thirsk, North Yorkshire, after receiving new information regarding her whereabouts.

Image Credit: Metro [Rania Alayed and Yazan Khatib, when he was younger. The son of a woman who was murdered by her husband has said that police have finally discovered her human remains over ten years after she was killed. Yazan Khatib's mum Rania Alayed, 25, was killed by his dad Ahmed Al-Khatib, 46, at an apartment in Salford, Greater Manchester, in June 2013. Al Khatib was handed a minimum term of 20 years for Rania's murder but it is unknown how he exactly killed her and her remains were never found. But now detectives have now found Rania's remains on wasteland on the A19 near Thirsk, North Yorks., after Al-Khatib admitted to Yazan, now 21, that's where he left them.]

Although official identification is yet to take place, the force ‘strongly suspects’ the remains are Rania’s, the Manchester Evening News reports. Ms Alayed’s son Yazan said the discovery had ‘come as a surreal surprise to me and my family’.

‘Being able to provide a final resting place is all we have wanted,’ he said following the news. ‘To have the ability to lay down a few flowers for my mother is more than I can ask for from this world.’. Ms Alayed was killed by Al-Khatib in a premeditated ‘honour killing’ following years of abuse after he accused her of becoming ‘too westernised’ and ‘establishing an independent life’, it was revealed during his trial.

Sentencing him, Judge Justice Leggatt, told Al-Khatib: ‘The contempt you showed for Rania in death matched the contempt of how you treated her in life’. Following the discovery, Detective Chief Inspector Neil Higginson said: ‘More than a decade after her murder, we now strongly believe we have located Rania’s body and are finally able to provide closure to her family, who we know have endured so much pain and grief over the years.

‘Her murder was utterly horrific and not knowing where her body is has inflicted further pain to all those who knew her.’. ‘I hope that we are now able to finally reunite her with her family, where she belongs, so that they can give her a proper resting place.’.

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