Kharotabad incident: SC asks for report on Chechens’ killing

Court describes Balochistan govt’s attempts to control violence inadequate.

ISLAMABAD:

The Supreme Court directed Balochistan Chief Secretary Ahmad Bux Lehri to share the findings of his investigation into the May 17 killing of five Chechens in Quetta who were mistakenly suspected of being terrorists by the police and the Frontier Corps.

The court issued the direction while presiding over the case on target killings in Balochistan. The court is investigating the deteriorating law and order situation in Pakistan’s largest province by area.

The apex court has taken suo motu notice of the Chechens’ killings, which is also the subject of a judicial inquiry in Balochistan. Lehri was also ordered by Balochistan Chief Minister Nawab Aslam Raisani to conduct an inquiry into the incident and bring the officials responsible to account.

“The country has been defamed due to this incident,” said Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry. “The government has not taken any action against the killing of the five Chechens.”

The court directed the chief secretary to submit his investigation report at the next hearing, scheduled for two weeks later.

At the beginning of the hearing, Lehri had submitted a report outlining the steps the Balochistan government has taken to improve the law and order situation in the province over the last three years. The court deemed those measures to be inadequate.

“Why is the law and order situation not being controlled,” asked the chief justice.

Lehri had no real response to the questioning from the bench except to say that Quetta would have control over the situation ‘soon’.

Justice Sair Ali asked how many terrorists have been arrested by the Balochistan government. Lehri had no reply, though he said that the police are working towards rescuing kidnapped lawyers and would have results ‘soon’.

The chief justice remarked that the law and order situation in Balochistan deteriorated sharply after the killing of Nawab Akbar Bugti. “If action had been taken against Bugti’s killers, the situation would have been better today,” he said.

Meanwhile a constitutional petition was filed by Tariq Asad, an Islamabad-based lawyer, seeking an investigation into the terrorist attack on the Mehran naval air base in Karachi on May 22.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 24^th, 2011.