Dr Asim case: ATC orders arrest of ‘absconding’ MQM, PPP accused

Non-bailable warrants issued for MQM and PPP mayoral candidates

KARACHI: An anti-terrorism court (ATC) in Karachi has issued non-bailable arrest warrants for political leaders, including those from the Muttahida Qaumi Movement and Pakistan Peoples Party, after they were declared absconders in the Dr Asim Hussain terror facilitation case.

ATC-II on Wednesday issued warrants for MQM mayoral candidate Waseem Akhtar, Anis Qaimkhani, Saleem Shahzad, PPP’s Qadir Patel and Usman Moazzam of socio-political group Pasban.

The absconders have been accused of asking Dr Asim, in his capacity as the head of the Ziauddin Hospitals, to treat on discounted rates the militants injured in encounters with law enforcers and to shelter them.

The ATC judge, at the beginning of the hearing, expressed displeasure with the investigating officer (IO), DSP Altaf Hussain, as the latter submitted a progress report. The judge asked him as to why the court was not informed of any absconders in the previous hearing. The IO said the accused had obtained bails from the Sindh High Court in a number of cases. When asked by the judge if he investigated which cases they were, the IO replied that he had not.

The court had the agenda of supplying copies of prosecution data to the accused. This could not be done since the IO had not provided a list of witnesses to the court. When Dr Asim’s attorney, Anwar Mansoor Khan, raised the matter before the judge, the IO contended that he was not done with the list yet and sought time for it.

The judge, then, directed him to complete the documents and also arrest the absconding suspects by next hearing on January 8, 2016.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 31^st, 2015.