Pakistan

On death row: In K-P, fate of nearly 200 prisoners hangs in the balance

Officials say no black warrant has yet been issued for any of the convicts.

Creative: Aamir Khan/Our Correspondent December 24, 2014

PESHAWAR: Of the 192 prisoners on death row in prisons across Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, 10 have been convicted by anti-terrorism courts.

No black warrant has yet been issued for any of them and mercy pleas of 10 of these prisoners are presently pending. These ten convicts will be hanged if their petitions are turned down.

According to official data available with The Express Tribune, seven prisoners on death row are at Central Prison Peshawar, four in Central Prison DI Khan, 140 in Central Prison Haripur, 16 in Central Prison Bannu, 24 in district jail of Timergara and one in district jail of Manshera. There is no woman among the convicts.

There are 22 prisons in the province, including four central jails, 10 district jails and eight sub-jails or judicial lock-ups. Incidentally, there are no gallows at Haripur jail which houses the largest number of condemned prisoners. Thus, a decision has been taken to make arrangements to carry out the executions there.

"We need to understand that not all of the 192 prisoners on death row in K-P jails can be hanged," said an official of Central Prison Peshawar.

He added capital punishment is handed by a sessions court after which applicants move the high court and then the Supreme Court. If the Supreme Court upholds the penalty, a final mercy plea is sent to the President and the criminal is only hanged once that is rejected, shared the official.

An official of the prison department said there is little chance the pending mercy pleas of these 10 convicts will be converted to life imprisonment.

"Once their mercy pleas are rejected, the executions will be held at Central Prison Peshawar, Central Prison DI Khan, Haripur and Timergara. Army contingents have been deployed in the four jails where executions will take place, but we don’t have black warrants for any of the prisoners at the moment."

Published in The Express Tribune, December 25^th, 2014.