Peshawar High Court puts govt on notice for ban on PTM

PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court (PHC) on Tuesday again put on notice the federal and provincial governments in a petition challenging the ban on the Pashtun Tahafuz Movement (PTM) and putting the names of its chief and other members in the Schedules 1 and 4 of the Anti-Terrorism Act 1997.

A two-member bench comprising Justice SM Attique Shah and Justice Sahibzada Asad heard the case.

Attaullah Kundi appeared for the petitioner. The deputy attorney general represented the federal government while the additional advocate general was from the KP government.

The counsel for the PTM told the court the movement was launched in 2014 to work for the protection of the Pakhtun rights.

The PTM, he said, was running a movement for basic human rights, rule of law, accountability, and putting an end to extra-judicial killings and resolving the issue of the enforced disappearances through peaceful means.

He said the PTM announced arranging a Jirga in the Regi Lalma area of the Khyber tribal district to help the Pakhtuns gather on a single platform.

The counsel said the federal government on October 6, a few days before the Jirga, banned the PTI through a notification. It was outlawed by invoking Section 11 of the Anti-Terrorism Act (ATA) 1997.

He said the PTM was accused of being involved in activities against the state and hence was a threat to peace and security.

The counsel said the government had amended the Anti-Terrorism Act 2014 under which a person could be arrested without any notice and an organisaiton banned without listening to its office-bearers.

He said later the government put the names of the PTM members in the first and fourth schedules of the ATA 1997, requesting the court to order the removal of the PTM members’ names from these lists.