KARACHI: An antiterrorism court issued on Wednesday a notice to a prosecutor on an application seeking transfer of two prisoners on death row from the Sukkur jail to the Karachi prison before their hanging.

Attaullah, alias Qasim, and Mohammad Azam, alias Sharif, of the banned Lashkar-i-Jhangvi, were sentenced to death by an antiterrorism court in 2004 for killing Dr Ali Raza Peerani on sectarian grounds outside his clinic in Soldier Bazaar in 2001.

On Jan 24, the trial court issued black warrants for both condemned prisoners and fixed Feb 3 for their hanging since the superintendent of the Karachi central prison asked the court for issuance of fresh death warrants.

Hashim Khan, the father of Attaullah, through his counsel moved an application before the trial court and submitted that the Sindh High Court had asked the jail authorities in October 2013 to move both convicts back to the Karachi prison 15 days ahead of their execution.

The applicant contended that the SHC order was still intact, but the jail authorities had not shifted them back and asked the trial court to issue directives for compliance with the high court order.

The judge of the ATC-V, Mohammad Javed Alam, issued a notice to the prosecutor on the application for Thursday.

Meanwhile, the applicant’s lawyer Mushtaq Ahmed said that he had also moved the high court to stay the planned execution till the compliance with its order and for contempt of court proceedings against the respondents.

Both condemned prisoners, who along with their alleged chief Mohammad Ajmal better known as Akram Lahori, have also been facing trial in two more sectarian and a policeman killing cases, were shifted from Karachi to the Sukkur prison in 2012 due to what the provincial authorities described as security concerns.

Published in Dawn, January 29th, 2015

On a mobile phone? Get the Dawn Mobile App: Apple Store | Google Play