Court cancels case against al Qaeda suspect after no evidence found

An anti-terrorism court directed the police on Monday to conduct an inquiry before lodging an FIR on the basis on an intelligence report by a federal agency.

The ATC-XII judge also cancelled the case lodged against Asif Zaheer for allegedly being a fundraiser for proscribed militant organisation al Qaeda after no evidence was found against him during the investigation.

Zaheer was booked by the Counter-Terrorism Department under sections 11-H, 11-N and 11-F(i)(ii) of the Anti-Terrorism Act on March 26, 2020 when he had already been in custody of a law enforcement agency.

The FIR was registered on the basis of a report from an intelligence agency that said this person collected funds for the organisation, and that the funds were used in terrorist activities throughout the country. The judge wrote in his order that perusal of the record revealed that the suspect had been behind bars since January 18, 2020, whereas no evidence was found by the investigation officer and this case was totally based on the intelligence report.

He added that no offence was committed by the accused due to his captivity. He questioned when there was no time or date of the alleged offence, how the FIR could be registered. He drew inference from a meeting of the National Judicial Policy Making Committee dated April 29, 2019, sharing a mechanism to deal with intelligence report-based cases by the police before the registration of FIRs.

“Such an IR [intelligence report] is to be sent to the SP of the CTD or the relevant district, to which the same is marked by such intelligence agency and such SP initiates an inquiry, and if they reach the conclusion, then an FIR is to be lodged,” the order reads.

The judge further observed that then the gist of the inquiry be made part of the FIR so that the number of C-class cases be reduced. He added that doing so would save time and burden on the courts as well the on the investigation system of the police. He ruled that the investigation report under Section 168 of the Code of Criminal Procedure by the IO was fit for cancellation in C-class since no evidence was found against the accused during the probe.

The judge also referred the decision to Karachi’s additional inspector general of police, and the additional inspector general of the CTD for future compliance in accordance with the law.