KARACHI: The commission formed for the recovery of missing persons mainly from Sindh and Balochistan has come to know that three of the persons had been found dead in different parts of the country and at least two others were in internment camps in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, where authorities had been told to arrange their meetings with their families, it emerged on Monday.

The commission headed by retired Justice Dr Ghaus Muhammad took up 124 cases of enforced disappearances and double-checked details in the reports filed by the joint interrogation teams (JITs) with the information shared by the families of the missing persons during the six-day proceedings last week.

“By the end of week-long proceedings, the commission sorted out 44 cases,” said a source privy to the details of the proceedings. “These 44 are closed now for different reasons. It came to the commission’s notice through intelligence and investigation reports that two persons, Shoaib Ghufran and Muhammad Nasir Khan, are actually confined in internment camps in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa or Fata and three of them are no longer alive as their bodies have been found in different areas.”

The commission head in a prompt action wrote to the KP chief secretary and authorities in Fata to arrange meetings of the two detained persons with their families to help end their agony of search of their loved ones. Similarly, the cases of Syed Qasim Ali, Abdul Jabbar and Noor Alam were declared ‘closed’ after reports that their bodies had been found in different areas, he added.

“The families of those detained at those centres have also been informed about the initiative. Their meetings with their loved ones are expected soon after other formalities are completed,” he said.

Dr Ghaus Muhammad took charge as a member of the Commission of Inquiry on Enforced Disappearances (CIED) on Oct 13 which is actually headed by retired Justice Javed Iqbal to address the cases of missing persons mainly from Sindh and Balochistan.

After approval of his appointment by the prime minister, the commission initiated the proceedings on Oct 20 to sort out 44 of the 124 cases by Oct 25. During the proceedings, the commission was informed that 33 people, initially declared missing persons, had returned home during the previous few months and their cases could no longer be considered as of enforced disappearance.

“Three more people were traced as they were found in Karachi, Hyderabad and Lakki Marwat prisons while cases of two men do not fall under the defined term of enforced disappearance. The commission also dropped another name from the list as his family could not be traced,” he added.

The commission, he said, also heard grievances of 19 families whose loved ones had been missing for the past several months and after finding several bits of information contradictory to those mentioned in the JITs, ordered fresh investigations into their cases.

“The commission ordered immediate JITs of cases of 19 missing persons — four of them associated with the Muttahida Qaumi Movement. The commission will resume its proceedings on Nov 14 and has issued directives to all officials and institutions concerned to complete their jobs by then,” added the source.

Published in Dawn, November 4th, 2014