News
SC admits appeals in Musharraf assassination attempt case
ISLAMABAD, April 12 : The Supreme Court on Wednesday admitted for regular hearing appeals of four junior officers of Pakistan Air Force and a civilian against their death sentence for their involvement in an assassination attempt on President General Pervez Musharraf in Rawalpindi in 2003.
The Military Court awarded death sentence to Mushtaq Ahmed, a civilian and four junior officers of the Pakistan Air Force, including Chief Technician, Khalid Mehmood, Corporal Technician Nawazish Ali, Junior Technicians, Adnan Rasheed and Niaz Muhammad for being part of a December 14, 2003 conspiracy to assassinate President Musharraf by blowing up the Jhanda Chichi Bridge near Rawalpindi.
The Lahore High Court on March 14, 2006 rejected the petition of Mushtaq Ahmed on the ground that it has no jurisdiction to hear such a petition. Later the petitions of other four Air Force officials were also rejected on the same grounds.
Earlier, counsel of the petitioners, Col (Retd) Muhammad Akram and Hashmat Habib Advocate argued that Mushtaq Ahmed could not be sentenced to death by the military court under the Air Force Act because he was a civilian, and not a regular employee of Pakistan Air Force.
He argued that the conviction of the petitioner under Section 37 (e) and the award of the sentence of death to him is erroneous as the subjection of the petitioner to the PAF Act is contingent upon the condition of being accused of having committed a civil offence under Section 131 of the PPC whereas Section 37 (e) of the PAF Act contains a Military Offence.
Colonel ® Muhammad Akram contended that there is no evidence against four junior officers of Pakistan Air Force and said that they were arrested without any charges. He added that they could only be arrested after they have been charged.He argued that the evidence of an accused is not acceptable in Islam adding that the four Air Force officials cannot be made prosecutor witnesses against Muhstaq Ahmed.
He told the court that all the convicts are denying the confessional statement and saying that they are innocent and were falsely charged.
Colonel ® Muhammad Akram said that he was not provided any copy of the proceeding against the convicts in the Military Court.
Attorney General for Pakistan, Makhdoom Ali Khan argued that the Supreme Court can only interfere if a judgment of a court is corum-non-judice, without jurisdiction or malafide.
He said contended that 42 witnesses were examined in the case. He that there is nothing on record which confirms that Mushtaq has retracted his confessional statement adding that Mushtaq has supported his confessional statement.
He argued that the copy of the proceeding of the Military Court was not provided to the defense counsel according to rule of PAF Act however, he said, the entire record was made available to the defense counsel.
The Supreme Court Bench comprising Justice Faqir Muhammad Khokhar and Justice M Javed Buttar referred the case to Chief Justice of the Supreme Court to fix it for early hearing.