Abbottabad riots: Fresh FIR against three police officials ordered

ISLAMABAD: A National Assembly committee recommended institution of fresh cases against three top police officials of Abbottabad who mishandled the riots against renaming of the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province early this year. The committee also directed suspension of doctors involved in preparing bogus reports of the incident.

The National Assembly Standing Committee on Human Rights on Wednesday directed Abbottabad’s District Coordinating Officer (DCO) to lodge a fresh FIR against the then Regional Police Officer (RPO) Imtiaz Altaf, District Police Officer (DPO) Mohammad Iqbal and Station House Officer (SHO) Asif Gauhar, holding them responsible for the death of seven protesters and injury of hundreds more on April 12.

The committee, which met in Islamabad with MNA Riaz Fatyana in the chair, observed that instead of peacefully dispersing the protesters, the district police opened indiscriminate fire on them. The protesters were demanding a separate province after the passage of 18th Amendment, which renamed the North-West Frontier Province as Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa.

The former DPO, RPO and SHO, who had ordered the firing, had justified their actions by saying that the mob was moving towards the police station with the intention to set it on fire.

But the Federal Secretary for Human Rights pointed out that the investigation report shows that the police opened fire from a distance and that the protesters were not close enough to the police station to set it on fire.

He stunned the committee members by citing a doctor’s report, describing the cause of death of one of the injured persons in the hospital due to falling from his bed. The committee directed that the doctors who had prepared such bogus reports be suspended and inquiry be conducted against them. Fatyana said that the concerned officers violated human rights and misused their authority. “There are different tactics to disperse mobs in every country without harming them,” he said, adding that “the culprits must be brought to book”.

He directed the incumbent DCO to lodge a fresh FIR and report to the committee within three days. Otherwise action will be taken against him.

Pakistan Peoples Party lawmaker Farah Naz Isfahani said, “Why did they shoot at the unarmed protesters? We should set a precedent by punishing the officers who violated the law and human rights.”

The committee in its previous meeting on December 1 had expressed its dissatisfaction over the investigation report prepared by a judicial committee, which was led by a judge of Peshawar Higher Court, saying that it failed to fix the responsibility of the gruesome incident.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 30^th, 2010.