Pakistan

Legislation on 'missing persons' issue will be ready soon: Khawaja Asif

Supreme Court tells Defence Minister to recover 35 Baloch missing persons by Dec 2.

Web Desk November 28, 2013

Newly appointed Minister for Defence Khawaja Asif. PHOTO: REUTERS.

KARACHI: Newly appointed Defence Minister Khawaja Asif said on Thursday that the federal government would soon introduce laws on the 'missing persons' issue after a hearing at the Supreme Court's Karachi registry, Express News reported.

The court had earlier on Thursday ordered the federal government today to recover 35 Baloch missing persons by December 2.

Asif, as the Defence Minister, appeared before the four-member larger bench – headed by Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry – along with the attorney general and Balochistan leaders on Thursday at the Karachi registry of the Supreme Court.

Speaking to the media after the hearing, Asif said the apex court had warned the federal government that the SC would take action against the relevant authorities if the said 35 individuals were not produced by Monday morning.

While responding to questions, Khawaja Asif also said that the federal government had finalised several legislative drafts on the issue of missing persons, which will be turned into law very soon.

The Minister said it was the responsibility of the state to locate missing persons and that no one could be detained without due process of law.

Earlier, Asif told the court that during the short period of four months‚ the government was able to locate 738 missing persons and it would make every effort to locate others.

Expressing dissatisfaction over the progress of the case, the chief justice said people had pinned their hopes on the new government but the situation had not changed.

Quoting instances where many people were abducted with the help of helicopters, the larger bench stated that the name of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) keeps coming up in the case.

The bench further said that the Frontier Corps (FC) is responsible for the law and order situation in the province and asked the FC IG to appear before the court and explain the security situation.

Chief Justice Chaudhry also mentioned the group of relatives of Baloch missing persons that walked from Karachi to Quetta on foot and said it was embarrassing that women and children had to come all the way here to seek justice.

He said they will not leave until their relatives are recovered.

COMMENTS (15)

Muneer | 10 years ago | Reply

During the case hearing the CJ Iftitkhar Chaudhry remarked that he had evidence that the Police had handed over the ' missing persons', to the Intelligence agencies.If it is true,then they are not ' missing persons ',and record exist.What and whose purpose the CJ wants to fill by calling these persons in the court.Is he playing to 'gallery',or wants to defame some?.The relatives could be told that they are with the authorities and ask the government to arrange meeting at an appropriate time.

Tribune Reader | 10 years ago | Reply From Karachi to Quetta or other way round? Anyways this group of travellers is an anti state propoganda group formed by BSO Azaad who is responsible for spreading hatered for Pakistan among the Baloch Urban middle class youth at schools, col,eges and universities across the province. They have the support and protection of these militant terrorist groups like BLA and BRA, otherwise a safre passage from Quetta to other parts of the country is not a possibility, their missing loved ones havent been abducted by the FC but have fled and joined these baloch terrorist groups in the mountains or Afghanistan. The mutilated bodies u hear off are off those terrorists killed in direct armed battle with police and FC, if police and FC are fired upon their soldiers killed, will they present them with roses, others picked up by the FC are those linked with seperatist terrorist groups, dont let the self hating Pakistani media fool u.