Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) government is seeking the support of thousands of witnesses to appear before court and help bring nearly 900 accused terrorists, being handed over by security agencies to the provincial government, to justice.
“We make an appeal to all concerned persons to help us by appearing before the courts as witnesses against terrorists held in different jails of the province, and bring them to justice,” said Khyber- Pakhtunkhwa Minister for Law and Parliamentary Affairs Barrister Arshad Abdullah, while talking to the media outside the Peshawar High Court here on Monday.
The minister said prisoners held in different K-P jails were still being interrogated and would be handed over by the security agencies after the completion of all security procedures.
“Security agencies are in the process of handing over around 700 to 900 prisoners to the provincial government,” said Abdullah, adding that the government had decided to establish internment centres in the province to house these terrorists at a separate location.
“The decision to shift these terrorists was taken due to security concerns as they needed to be kept under strict surveillance,” the minister said, adding that once the internment centres had been established, relatives of the accused terrorists and their lawyers would be allowed to visit them.
The minister went on to add that thirty-two cases would be reinvestigated. Since witnesses were unwilling to appear before the court, the minister said the government has decided to publicly seek the support of such witnesses to help resolve the situation as quickly as possible.
“We are proud that we don’t have any differences with the judiciary,” the minister said, while addressing the High Court Bar Association, adding that the setup of a judicial academy in the province was also under way.
Published in The Express Tribune, February 21st, 2012.
COMMENTS (12)
Comments are moderated and generally will be posted if they are on-topic and not abusive.
For more information, please see our Comments FAQ
1725030039-0/Untitled-design-(2)1725030039-0-165x106.webp "article")
when has courts served Justice?
@Pakistan Pollitics you say 'Due to lot of serious problems in legal system one shouldn’t criticize ISI for lack of evidence and illegal abduction'. Here you do not need proof while you were screaming PROOF for Hafiz Muhammad Saeed. See the double policy being played here?
Due to lot of serious problems in legal system one shouldn't criticize ISI for lack of evidence and illegal abduction
Hahaha what a country , a journalists get killed for being anti establishment, but terrorist are freed due lack of evidence.
soon they will be free to do suicide bombing we need to CHANGE LAWS
The court should respect the agencies. Afterall they would have their own proofs though inadmissible to the court and definitely they would not have put any innocent behind the bars.
Let's see now how all these terrorists WALK AWAY FREE as our outdated prosecution system cannot and will not be able to convict them.
Blame the agencies more... the media has played a major role in this... They will also SUFFER from the hands of these terrorists with the rest of the society.
The relatives of missing TERRORISTS are protesting now? where were these relatives and families when their family member was getting involved in terrorist activities???
WITHIN 3 months of their handing over to KP Govt. these TERRORISTS will be released without fail.Who would like to be a witness of these beasts??? Even if the witnesses were assured of secrecy, someone sympathetic to these beasts is bound to leak it and you know what will happen to the witness!!! There should be legislation for not releasing terrorists .
All of these terrorists will be set free by our honourable courts.
A naive call by KPK Govt!!!!!
How can you urge common defenseless people to come forward as witnesses, jeopardize their life and testify against the condemned terrorists when the government high officials (Salman Taseer, Shahbaz Bhatti etc) themselve are not safe despite having the state machinery at their back?
In the backdrop of a flawed judicial system where criminals can get away by hiring the big lawyers to fool the system & get away with whatever they do, the only way to bring these criminals to justice is to exterminate them mercilessly as soon as they confess. It should not matter whether agencies, police or military takes the lead to behead them. The polluted climate must have to be purged.
Soon the courts will liberate them for want of ""witness"", and justice will be served. Media and politicians should rejoice on their release. Sooner than later these terrorists will be back in their business of killing, bombing, kidnapping, extortions and imposing their cult on the Muslims. After all when these terrorists are released, it means that common man does not have “Human Rights".
Our courts and our laws are unable to punish the culprit. However , you give a good food and small amount and you can get hordes of 'witnesses' to accuse an innocent. Unfortunately these culprits would be released by our esteemed courts and the old english legal system. Only if ET can pubilsh photos or names of these culprits , we can just be amazed at coming across the name again few years down the road in some suicide attempt or firing incident etc etc.