KARACHI, Jan 5: The hearing of a case against six members of Harkat-ul-Mujahideen al-Alami regarding an attempt to kill President Pervez Musharraf in Karachi in 2002 was adjourned on Saturday by an anti-terrorism court for further arguments of the defence counsel.

The six militants, Mohammad Imran, Mohammad Hanif alias Ayub, Mohammad Ashraf, Waseem Akhtar, Mohammad Jamil and Arsalan alias Sharib, were facing retrial being held inside the Central Prison Karachi for security reasons.

Special public prosecutor Mazhar Qayyum told Dawn that the court, headed by Judge Ghulam Ali Samtio, adjourned the hearing till Jan 8 on a request by defence counsel Abdul Waheed Katpar.

He said Mr Katpar wanted to argue further but he submitted before the court that during the recent violence following the assassination of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto miscreants set a bank on fire in Clifton and his office was situated in that building. In the fire his record was also burnt, therefore, he could not prepare his arguments.

The court allowed his request and adjourned the matter for Tuesday.

According to the prosecution, the six accused have been charged with attempting to assassinate the president by parking an explosive-laden vehicle near Falak Naz Plaza and blow it up with a remote control device. The presidential cavalcade was about to pass by and the accused were set to blow up the vehicle but the remote control did not work, foiling their plot.

In the course of investigation, the police and law-enforcement agencies arrested Mohammad Imran and Mohammad Hanif, who police claimed confessed to their involvement in the plot during the interrogation.

The prosecution has based its arguments on the confessional statements given by Imran, Hanif and Ashraf. It insisted that the accused had given their confessional statements voluntarily before a judicial magistrate, and quoted them as saying that they, along with their other accomplices, had tried to kill President Musharraf after taking offence to his anti-Taliban and pro-America policies. It called for the capital punishment to be awarded to the accused.

The defence side told the court that the confessional statements were taken under duress. It said that police had tortured the accused to force them to confess to the crime. It prayed for the benefit of the doubt to be given to the accused, maintaining that the prosecution story was cooked up, false and full of contradictions.

Earlier, an anti-terrorism appellate bench of the Sindh High Court had set aside the sentences given to the accused by the ATC and directed the latter to hold a retrial.