SHC commutes death sentence of convict to life term

Lawyer had argued that there were contradictions in statements of prosecution witnesses

KARACHI: A convict allegedly belonging to alQaeda got a new lease of life on Tuesday when the Sindh High Court (SHC) commuted his death sentence to life imprisonment in the case of an attack on the United States (US) consulate in 2006.

A two-judge appellate bench, comprising Justice Salahuddin Panhwar and Justice Yousuf Ali Syed, pronounced the verdict, which was earlier reserved by them.

The convict, Anwarul Haq, was handed down capital punishment on March 5, 2008 after an anti-terrorism court found him guilty. The suicide blast on March 2, 2006 near the gates of the US consulate in Karachi had killed an American diplomat, David Foy, and four others, including the suicide bomber. The attack took place on the eve of the visit of the then US president George W Bush to Pakistan.

The investigators believed that the blast had wounded 49 other people and was aimed at disrupting Bush's visit to Pakistan. However, the American president went ahead with his trip to Islamabad as scheduled.



According to the prosecution, a suicide bomber parked his explosives-laden car outside the naval establishment on the day of the incident and when the convoy of the US official appeared, the bomber rammed his vehicle into the bullet-proof car. The vehicle blew up before landing across a concrete barrier on the pavement of Marriott Hotel.

After the incident, the police had tracked down two suspects, Haq and Usman Ghani, during a raid in August, 2006 in Karachi, claiming that both were involved in the planning of the attack. The police had claimed that they were trained militants with links to alQaeda and had fought against the US forces in Afghanistan.

The police investigators also identified the suicide bomber as Muhammad Tahir who has allegedly planned the attack with Haq and Ghani.

Haq was later sentenced to three counts of life imprisonment and four counts of death penalty, besides imposition of a fine of Rs1.5 million, while Ghani was acquitted by the trial court for lack of evidence. The judge gave him the benefit of the doubt and ordered his release.



 

Arguments from defence

After the sentence, Haq went for appeal in the SHC. The defence lawyer, Muhammad Farooq, informed the court that his client was falsely booked in the case and the confessional statement was recorded under duress without completion of legal formalities.

He pointed out that there were glaring contradictions in the statements of the prosecution witnesses and their presence on the scene of crime was dubious, while the identification parade was also not held in a proper manner.

 

Links with suicide bomber

The lawyer also maintained that Tahir, the alleged suicide bomber who died in the attack according to the police, had died somewhere in Afghanistan and on such reports his family had offered his funeral prayers in absentia. He argued that there was no evidence that Haq had any links with the person who had carried out the suicide attack.

"The prosecution has failed to prove its case and, therefore, the appellant client should be acquitted," Advocate Farooq argued. He also contended that his client, Haq, was presented in the trial court as a 'facilitator', not as a 'key' suspect in the suicide bombing. He pleaded to the court that the trial court had convicted the appellant and awarded him sentences by ignoring the evidence put forward by the defence during the trial.



"The appellant, Haq, lost one of his legs when he mistakenly stepped over an explosive mine in his hometown of Tank [near North Waziristan]," the lawyer pointed out.

The special prosecutor informed the court that an accused who was absconding in the case, Qari Zafar, was killed in an attack by the US drone in the frontier region.

In the judgment announced on Tuesday, the SHC commuted the death sentence of Haq into life imprisonment.