Assassination attempt: AJK high court’s top judge escapes bid on life
Medics say Justice Ghulam Mustafa Mughal sustained a bullet wound to his abdomen which is not life-threatening.
Justice Mughal was taking an evening walk at the recreation ground of AJK University in the Chahaila Bandi area when a gunman lurking in the bushes shot him in the abdomen, police official Riaz Abbasi said.
Mughal was rushed to the Combined Military Hospital in Muzaffarabad, where doctors said his wounds were not life-threatening and that he would be operated upon. A team of senior medics has been assigned to treat him.
Police said the motive for the attack was unclear. “At the moment, we cannot say whether it’s terrorism or some type of enmity,” said Abbasi.
Senior Minister Chaudhry Yasin told Express News that the shooting was under investigation. Police said Mughal left his driver and guard outside the recreation ground where he began his evening walk. It was not immediately clear whether Mughal had been threatened before the assassination attempt.
The AJK Supreme Court chief justice ordered the police to arrest the assailant “within 24 hours.”
“It was the worst-ever incident in the judicial history of Azad Kashmir,” Justice Muhammad Azam Khan, who is touring Mirpur, told The Express Tribune. He ordered Inspector-General AJK Police Tariq Khokher to investigate the case.
Following the incident Justice Khan cut short his official trip and hurried back to Muzaffarabad to personally monitor the investigations.
AJK Prime Minister Chaudhry Abdul Majeed, who is currently touring the United Kingdom, also condemned the attack and ordered a high-level inquiry.
Threats to judges are not uncommon in Pakistan. In Rawalpindi, the judge who sentenced to death the killer of former Punjab governor Salmaan Taseer was transferred to Lahore after his courtroom was ransacked following the verdict.
Police commando Malik Mumtaz Hussain Qadri had confessed to the January 4 assassination because Taseer proposed amendments to the controversial blasphemy laws. Qadri’s supporters and lawyers ransacked Judge Pervez Ali Shah’s courtroom after this month’s sentencing.
Following media reports that Shah had fled abroad, a spokesman for the Lahore High Court (LHC) said on Tuesday that he had taken temporary leave in order to perform hajj in Saudi Arabia.
“He remains the presiding officer of the child protection court. He left with proper permission from the LHC. There is no truth in the press reports that he left the country because of threats to his life,” he said.
(With additional input from AFP)
Published in The Express Tribune, October 26th, 2011.
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