PHC moved against death sentence by military court

PESHAWAR: A woman has challenged in the Peshawar High Court (PHC) her son’s four time death sentence awarded by a military court.
Saidona Bibi, a resident of Zareef Koroona in Peshawar, moved the PHC against her son’s death sentence through her lawyer Shah Faisal Nasapi.
She claimed in the writ petition that her 18-year old son Shah Nawaz, was a labourer and was picked up by the law-enforcing agencies in 2012. She said since than his whereabouts were unknown.
She said her family came to know through newspapers on September 22 that her son had been awarded death sentence by the military court.
She appealed to the high court to suspend the death sentence and order the production of the record to know her son’s crime for which he had been awarded capital punishment.
Meanwhile, official sources insisted that the terror convict Shah Nawaz was an active member of the outlawed Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and was found involved in the killing of two military personnel and two civilians and attacks on the security forces.
The sources said the convict had confessed his involvement in the killings of soldiers and civilians and was thus awarded the death sentence by the military court.
Recently, the PHC had upheld the conviction and death sentence awarded to two other militants including a ‘juvenile’ by the military courts after conducting in-camera hearing into their cases. The bench comprising of Chief Justice Mazhar Alam Miankhel and Justice Irshad Qaiser had dismissed two petitions filed by the mothers of the convicts, Haider Ali and Qari Zahir Gul, against their conviction by military courts for involvement in acts of terrorism.
The court had earlier stayed the execution of both the convicts. Following the dismissal of these petitions the stay order also stood vacated.
The ISPR, the media wing of Pakistan Army, on April 2 announced that the Army chief General Raheel Sharif had confirmed conviction and sentence of death awarded to six terrorists.
It said the convicts had committed heinous offences related to terrorism, including slaughtering men, suicide bombings, kidnapping for ransom, and colossal damage to life and property.
The six convicts were identified as Noor Saeed, Haider Ali, Murad Khan, Inayatullah, Israruddin and Qari Zahir Gul.
The military courts have been established after the passage of the 21st Amendment to the Constitution and subsequent amendments to the Army Act.