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Tuesday March 19, 2024

Find Rao

February 22, 2018

The disappearance of Rao Anwar – who allegedly killed Naqeebullah Mehsud in a ‘police encounter’ – has highlighted the issue of custodial and targeted killings. The only deterrence to crime is punishment through effective prosecution and the enactment of laws that make forensic evidence permissible and ensure the protection of witnesses. This cannot be achieved without a trained and qualified police force that is selected on the basis of merit, equipped with the necessary tools and remains independent of political intervention. The supremacy of the constitution over all state institutions must be guaranteed if rule of law is to prevail and zero-tolerance policy must be adopted over extra-judicial killings.

The unfortunate reality is that custodial killings are a remnant of the tyrannical British Raj and is practiced by all occupation forces. The only difference is that this tactic was defiantly in the Jallianwala Bagh massacre and even today by the Zionist regime in Gaza and the Indian troops in Kashmir. This practice should have been discontinued a long time ago and criminals ought to have been punished through the due process of the law. The need of the hour is to implement laws that cannot be broken bythe people.

Malik Tariq Ali

Lahore