Musharraf attack case: SC seeks report from Defence Ministry for two accused

Accused Rana Naveed, Ameer Sohail file petitions. SC seeks records of military court and LHC's decisions in the case.

ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court has sought a complete report from the Defence Ministry regarding petitions received from two accused allegedly involved in the attack on former President, General (Retd) Pervez Musharrraf.

A three-judge bench of the apex court headed by Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry were hearing the case.

Accepting the petition filed by Advocate Hashmat Habib on behalf of the two accused, Rana Naveed and Ameer Sohail, the court asked the ministry to present record of military courts’, court martial and Lahore High Court decisions.

Habib had challenged court martial of civilians under the army act, saying that how, without giving an ample opportunity for defence to an accused, a military could pronounce punishment to civilians. The advocate also mentioned that as Sohail was under 18, his identity card was not available, adding that the military court had misspelled his client’s name as Amir Sohail instead of Ameer Sohail.

He said that there was no evidence against the accused.

The court asked Habib to submit his written reply.

The hearing has been adjourned for two weeks.

Earlier on April 1, the SC had rejected the bail pleas of 13 convicts out of the 15 charged with targeting Musharraf and sought the case record of the other two by April 6.

The court had observed in its order that the points raised in the review applications against the previous Supreme Court decision had already been addressed in detail.

Hashmat Habib, counsel for Rana Naveed and Amir Sohail contended before the three-member bench headed by CJ Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhary that his clients were denied a fair trial and awarded death sentence by a military court. They were tried by the military court after being sentenced by a trial court to 20 and 10 years’ imprisonment respectively.

The court sought the record of proceedings in the military court against Rana Naveed and Amir Sohail from the ministry of defense by April 6. Col (retd) Akram appeared on behalf of the rest of the 13 accused and contended that his arguments in defence of his clients were not given due consideration at any forum. Since the convicts are civilians, they cannot be tried by a military court.