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| Pakistan SC upholds death sentence to 12 convivts in Musharraf case | | |
Islamabad, Sep 26 Pakistan Supreme Court has upheld the death sentence of 12 people found guilty of involvement in two assassination attempts on President Pervez Musharraf in 2003.
A military court had sentenced the 12 convicts to death. The Lahore High Court earlier rejected an appeal from the convicts, ruling that it did not have the jurisdiction to overturn the verdict of a military court.
''For reasons to be recorded later, the impugned order of the Lahore High Court is maintained, consequently the appeals are dismissed,'' Daily Times reported while quoting a short order passed by the SC bench of Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, Justice Abdul Hameed Dogar and Justice Sayed Saeed Ashhad.
Col (retd) Muhammad Akram and Hashmat Habib, counsels for the appellants, argued that the High Court did have the jurisdiction to hear appeals against the decisions of the military court under Article 199 (3). They also argued that the accused should have been tried according to Section 131 of the Pakistan Penal Code instead of Section 37(e) of the Air Force Act and 31 (d) of the Army Act, because most of them were civilians.
Mujeebur Rehman, counsel for the Defence Ministry, argued that the superior courts had no jurisdiction to hear appeals against the decisions of a military court under Article 199 (3) of the constitution.
Appearing on notice, Deputy Attorney General Nasir Saeed Shaikh submitted that special laws superseded other laws and he supported the arguments made by the counsel of the Defence Ministry.
The 12 convicts are Khalid Mehmood, Nawazish Ali, Niaz Muhammad and Adnan Rasheed (personnel of the Pakistan Air Force); Arshad Hussain (Lance Naek); and Rashid Qureshi, Ikhlas Ahmad, Ghulam Sarwar Bhatti, Zubair Ahmad, Rana Naveed Ahmad, Aamir Suhail and Mushtaq Ahmad (civilians).
A Field General Court Marshal sentenced ten of them to death for involvement in assassination attempts on Gen Musharraf, both in Rawalpindi, on December 14, 2003, and on December 25, 2003. Rana Naveed and Aamir Suhail were given life and 20-year prison terms, respectively, but these were later converted to death sentences by a military court of appeal. The defence lawyers argued that the military court of appeal’s decision to convert the prison terms to death sentences was ''unwarranted'', since the convicts had not moved an appeal and the prosecution had not asked for their sentences to be enhanced.
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