Court releases terror suspect on bail

PESHAWAR: An anti-terrorism court on Monday released on bail a terror suspect charged with attacking the Pakistan Air Force (PAF) base in Badaber in 2015.

Up to 29 people, including personnel of the PAF and military and some civilians had lost lives and all the 13 terrorists were killed in the attack. The anti-terrorism court judge Mehmoodul Hassan ordered the release of Abdul Karim on bail.

During the course of arguments, Sahibzada Riazatul Haq, the counsel for the terror suspect, submitted that the accused was arrested on March 12, 2019 at Customs Chowk near the Bacha Khan International Airport. He submitted that as per the police report under Section 161 of the CrPC he was nominated in two FIRs. In the first case, the police stated that Abdul Karim, a resident of Bara, in his statement before the police had confessed to his crime.

He had revealed that he was working for Indian spy agency Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), which was running from Kandahar in Afghanistan and distributing its funds among the terrorists in Pakistan including heads of banned organisation Lashkar-e-Islam, and Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan.

The police stated that the terror suspect had revealed that he had also distributed money among the attackers of PAF base in Badaber. It said 59 dollars were recovered from

his possession after the arrest. The lawyer pointed out before the court that first 59 dollars is not huge amount and every one could keep it and second , the police did not show or prove any connectivity of the accused with the PAF base attackers. He said that the police statement under Section 161 of the CrPC have no legal value unless the accused made his confession under section 164 CrPC before the court. The lawyer said that the accused Abdul Karim had joined the de-radicalisation centre during the time of the attack, thus he was wrongly charged in the case.