PHC seeks ministries’ reply in missing persons cases

PESHAWAR
The Peshawar High Court (PHC) on Wednesday directed the ministries of defence and interior to submit replies on behalf of the intelligence agencies in the missing persons’ cases.
Giving last chance to the ministries concerned, a division bench comprising of Chief Justice Mazhar Alam Miankhel and Justice Musarrat Hilali directed them to ensure submission of replies before the next hearing.
The chief justice observed that the court had given three chances to the secret agencies, including Inter-Services Intelligence, Military Intelligence and secretary Home and Tribal Affairs through the additional registrar (judicial) but replies were not submitted in the cases.
“Let it be the last chance to the respondent agencies and secretary Home Khyber Pakhtunkwha for submission of replies,” the chief justice stressed.
On the request of Additional Advocate General (AAG) Qaiser Ali Shah and Deputy Attorney General (DAG) Manzoor Khalil, the bench gave 15 days to the respondent ministries for submission of replies in the missing persons’ cases.
The bench issued direction to the ministries in the petition of Said Anwar, a resident of Mardan. His relative, Waqar, had been picked up by the intelligence agencies personnel in 2012 and there was no clue to his whereabouts since then.
The petitioner’s lawyer Shahnawaz Khan submitted before the bench that the additional registrar had given three chances to the respondents in the case, but replies were not submitted.
In the second case, DAG Manzoor Khalil stated that replies of Military Intelligence and secretary Home and Tribal Affairs were still awaited. The case concerned Khan Haider, a resident of Bara tehsil in Khyber Agency, who had been picked up by the secret agencies from Karkhano Market, Peshawar on November 26, 2009.
The bench disposed of two other missing persons’ cases after receiving the oversight board’s reports that the detainees were declared ‘black’ meaning hardcore militants.
In the first case, AAG Qaiser Ali Shah submitted the oversight board’s report in which two detainees including Yar Muhammad Khan and Khalid Khan, residents of Bara, were declared ‘black’.
In the second case, the oversight board had classified another two detainees, Ali Rehman and Sajjad Ali, who were shifted to the internment centre in Lakki Marwat, as ‘black’ as they happened to be hardcore militants.
In another case, the petitioner’s lawyer Neelam A Khan informed the bench that the missing person was recently shifted to the internment centre in Kohat, but the authorities concerned were not allowing the family to meet him at the centre.
The court directed the authorities to allow the family members to meet the detainee and sought oversight board’s report from commissioner Kohat in the case.