PHC stays execution of militant convicted by military court

PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court (PHC) on Thursday stayed the execution of a militant who had been awarded death sentence by a military court on terrorism charges.

A two-member bench comprising Chief Justice Mazhar Alam Miankhel and Justice Ikramullah Khan also issued a notice to the federal government to submit the record of the case before the next hearing.

The court suspended the death sentence after the wife of the convict Mutabar Khan, hailing from Swat district, filed a review petition through her lawyer Sahibzada Asadullah. The petition stated that the convict was handed over to the Pakistan Army by local elders in 2009 as he was required for interrogation.

The woman claimed that her husband was handed over to Colonel Kashif and Salman Akbar of Pakistan Army and she then met him twice in the internment centre located in Swat.