July 29, 2008	Tuesday	Rajab 25, 1429

KARACHI, July 28: The additional district and sessions judge-VII, south, Irfan Hussain Siddiqui, on Monday re-issued non-bailable warrants for the arrest of former National Accountability Bureau chairman Saifur Rehman Khan, his brother, Mujibur Rehman Khan, former inspector-general of police Rana Maqbool, former deputy inspector-general of police Farooq Amin Qureshi and former superintendent of the central prison Najaf Mirza in a case pertaining to a 1999 attempt on the life of Asif Ali Zardari, now co-chairman of the Pakistan People’s Party.

The court directed the inspector-general of police to execute the warrants till Aug 8. Earlier, the court had issued non-bailable warrants for the arrest of the accused on July 12. The SSP (Special Investigation Unit) was directed to arrest them and produce in court. However, he told the court on Monday that they could not be traced since some of them went underground while the remaining two were staying abroad.

The public prosecutor, Abdul Ma’aroof, requested the court to declare the accused absconders and get the warrants executed through Sindh IG police.

Turning down the request for declaring the accused absconders, the court re-issued non-bailable arrest warrants directing the IG to execute the same. Besides, the judge asked the police to provide complete details about the accused residing abroad and said that the help of Interpol might be sought for their arrest.

A charge-sheet was submitted in court by the investigation officer, Inspector Tairq Ali, on June 14. However, the court was informed that former DSP Amanat Javed and Naveed Saeed, nominated as the co-accused in the case, had died.

The prosecution said that the respondents had ‘unlawfully’ obtained the physical custody of Asif Ali Zardari from an anti-terrorism court on the night between May 15 and 16, 1999. They took him to the CIA Centre where they subjected him to torture and forced him to record incriminatory statements. Mr Zardari suffered injuries to his tongue and other parts of his body due to the torture while the police refused to register an FIR against the police officials attributing the incident to Zardari’s bid to commit suicide instead, the prosecution added.