Stoning to death of a soldier on orders of a Jirga is a travesty and needs to be roundly condemned.
PESHAWAR: The stoning to death of a soldier on orders of a tribal Jirga in Kurram Agency is a travesty and needs to be roundly condemned. The country’s highest court has already declared jirgas illegal, so the holding of the tribal jirga in this case should not have been permitted by the local authorities.
Furthermore, how could a soldier, who is subject to the Pakistan Penal Code and the Army Act, be subject to a judgment made by a jirga? Even the PPC clearly lays down clearly that a serving soldier cannot be arrested by the police and that the civil courts cannot proceed against him without informing and obtaining permission of the relevant army authorities.
It is incumbent on the army authorities to proceed with an iron hand against the jirga members who ordered this illegal sentence.
Sayed GB Shah Bukhari
Published in The Express Tribune, March 18th, 2013.
