Lawyer’s abduction case: Court warns capital’s top cop, sends notice to ISI chief

Directs IGP Tahir Alam Khan to produce ‘missing’ lawyer on July 3.

ISLAMABAD: The Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Wednesday issued notice to the director general of Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and warned IGP Tahir Alam Khan of registering a murder case against him and others if something happens to a lawyer allegedly picked up by armed men of the intelligence agency.

While issuing the notice, the single bench comprising Justice Shaukat Aziz Siddiqui directed the DG ISI to nominate an officer not less than a director to appear before the court. The court also warned the IGP that a murder case would be registered against him and others if the lawyer is killed.

The directions and observations came in response to police failure in producing a member of the Islamabad District Bar Association (DBA), Hammad Dadan, who along with two others was allegedly picked up on June 20, before the court despite repeated orders.

On June 30, the court had summoned the IGP after the police failed to produce Dadan observing that their failure was a question mark on the police’s performance.

In addition, the court once again issued notice to the ministry of defence to depute an official for making correspondence between the police and the intelligence agency as the official did not appear before the court on Wednesday’s hearing despite a court notice.

On Wednesday, the IGP appeared before the court and sought a week’s time in order to complete investigations and recover the lawyer. Khan told the court that location of the Hammad’s phone was somewhere in Peshawar and an officer was sent there.

When it was revealed that the officer sent to Peshawar was an ASI, Justice Siddiqui remarked that the police was not taking the matter seriously.

Justice Siddiqui directed the IGP to produce Dadan before the court on July 3.

Mumtaz Anwar Abbasi had approached the IHC saying his son, Hammad, along with three of his friends identified as Abdullah Umar, Ammar Dadan, and Ahmad, went to Masjid Imam Abu Daud near the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences for Taraweeh prayers on June 20.

At around 11pm, the petitioner, through his counsel Mirza Shahzad Akbar, said he received a call from his son asking him to come help him as his car was hit by another vehicle from behind near a private school. Abbasi said when he reached the spot, Ahmad and residents of the area and a number of policemen present there informed him that Hammad, Ammar and Abdullah were taken away by armed men belonging to an intelligence agency.

Abbasi has cited SHO Industrial Area police, Islamabad IGP, ISI DG and secretaries of the defence and interior ministries as respondents.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 2^nd, 2015.