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| Human Rights Watch blasts Musharraf over suspending judge | | |
NEW YORK, MAR 13
Blasting Pakistan for "arbitrary detention" of the Chief Justice of Supreme Court, a United States-based human rights watchdog has demanded his immediate release, and called for cessation of the police crackdown on lawyers staging peaceful protests.
Urging release of the chief justice, Human Rights Watch also appealed to the United States and other governments to push President Pervez Musharraf to promptly take meaningful steps to restore respect for the rule of law in Pakistan.
Terming the detention "illegal", the watchdog asserted that the dismissal and detention of the senior judge contravened provisions for the removal of judges under Pakistan's constitution, and severely undermined judicial independence in the country.
"By brazenly and unlawfully dismissing, detaining and humiliating the chief justice of the Supreme Court, President Musharraf has created a constitutional crisis at the judiciary's expense," said Ali Dayan Hasan, South Asia researcher for Human Rights Watch.
Musharraf, he said, has undermined judicial independence before and nothing could make that more clear than his "arrest" of the Chief Justice.
Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry was dismissed by Musharraf on March 9 for "misuse of office."
The government subsequently declared the chief justice to be "non-functional" and held him incommunicado at his official residence.
The Human Rights Watch criticised the Pakistani government for not releasing any details of the charges and its decision for an in camera hearing by Pakistan's Supreme Court of the reference made by it.
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