Mr. Munir A Malik, Attorney General of Pakistan, Subject: Fifth Categary Of Missing Persons Respected Sir, With great respect and deference, I appreciate your concern about the plight of missing persons. You have very correctly analysed and judged the various categories of sufferings of those people, however I intend to bring in your kind notice another category of missing persons, you may call them fifth category. The most wrecked and miserable category, because till date justice has been denied to them. That Fifth Category of people went missing and after years of captivity their families were shocked to know having found them in civil prisons as military trial convicts. There it was revealed that during black era of Pervaiz Musharraf, they were subjected to secret and fake trials where even the legal counsels were not allowed to represent them. No charge sheet and or any Summary of Evidence was felt necessary to be delivered to them before or during the trial. The proceedings of such fake trials are still not made available to the victims. The sufferers of those fake trials included civilians and military persons alike. The victims of those trials were awarded sentences ranging from rigorous imprisonments of various terms and deaths. The plight of families of such victims are beyond imagination and far from call of Justice. The Honourable High Courts despite their great concern feel handicapped because of the apathy and lack of response from military authorities because they consider themselves above the law, neither they offer comments nor appear before the courts when summoned in that regard. Here I would like to draw your kind attention towards a recent case decided by the apex court and reported in 2013 SCMR at 596 in the case of Rana Naveed Vs. Federation of Pakistan. Wherein it was observed that two missing persons Rana Naveed and Amir Sohail were awarded life imprisonment and ten years rigorous imprisonments respectively by the military court. The Military Court of Appeals converted the imprisonments of both the convicts to Death and refused to provide the trial proceedings. The apex court summoned the proceedings which was initially declined by the Military Authorities but on insistence, the proceedings were placed before the court and during scrutiny by the Honourable Supreme Court, It was revealed that both the persons neither filed appeals before the Military Court of Appeals nor the court of appeal gave notice to them for enhancement of their sentences. The apex court accepted the appeals and declared the enhanced sentences of both the convicts, illegal being without jurisdiction and corum non judice. The irony of the fact is that the said Army Court of Appeal was headed by a Corps Commander, Lt Gen. Javed Alam having two Brigadiers and Judge Advocate as the members of the Court. If injustice of such a grave nature is meeted out by a court of such great stature then what would be the affairs of normal military courts. The entire episode has been reported in the above mentioned case. Their was another case of L/Nk Islam Uddin Siddique, who was arrested from Peshawar, interrogated and tried by a secret court at Kharian, produced before a mock appellate court headed by a Maj Gen. at Sargodha and finally hanged in Central Jail Multan. His family was only intimated a day prior to his execution for last meeting. He was neither allowed to forward mercy petition to President nor Jail appeal to the apex court. The family of the late Islam uddin Siddique is still knocking at the doors of GHQ to know the charges for which he was hanged, even trial proceedings have been denied to them till date. Who is responsible for this cold blooded murder. At the moment so far as the information held with us, is that 12 people were awarded death penalties by fake military courts and waiting for execution. There are dozens others awarded rigorous imprisonments of various terms upto life and still languishing in the jails waiting for justice including 4 Officers. None out of them were provided trial proceedings inspite of repeated written requests and in certain cases, the orders of the superior courts were blatantly disobeyed. Denial of Justice definitely leads to anarchy, which we witnessed in recent past. Sir you being the senior most law officer of the Federation, are the custodian of the constitution. I, therefore, implore you to please cogitate on formation of a plausible strategy to rescue the fifth category of missing persons. With profound regards. Col Inaam (R)
Posted on: Wed, 31 Jul 2013 12:14:08 +0000
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