SARGODHA/FAISALABAD/LAHORE/TOBA TEK SINGH/GUJRANWALA/SAHIWAL: Seven death row convicts were sent to the gallows in jails across Pakistan in the early hours of Tuesday.
Convict Amjad Ali was involved in the triple murder of two women and a child. He was hanged in Sargodha's district jail.
An additional district and session judge had sentenced Ali to death in 2002, handing him down three death sentences. His mercy appeals to higher courts and the President of Pakistan were rejected.
The convict's death warrants were issued by jail authorities yesterday after which he was executed.
Two convicts Iftikhar and Asif were sent to the gallows in Central Jail Faisalabad for committing murders. Iftikhar had killed a man in 2001 and was sentenced to death by an Anti-Terrorism Court (ATC) in 2004.
Meanwhile, Asif was sentenced to death in 1998 for killing a man the same year. After their mercy appeals were rejected, jail authorities issued their death warrants last week and the convicts were hanged today.
An anti-terrorism court last week issued a death warrant for convict Sher Ali who was executed today in Kot Lakhpat Central Jail, Lahore. Sher Ali was sentenced to death in 2001 for killing a man named Naveed in Kahna over personal enmity.
Jail authorities said that Ali’s mercy pleas were turned down by the superior judiciary and the president of Pakistan. The presiding judge approved the jail authorities' request and issued death warrants with directives for execution.
Noor Ahmed was hanged in Toba Tek Singh District Jail for murdering six people from his family including his father and brother.
The killings took place over a land dispute in 2006 and an ATC court in Faisalabad sentenced him to death six times. After his mercy appeals were rejected by the Lahore High Court and the apex court, a special court judge ordered for his death warrant.
A convict named Ishaq was sentenced to death in 2002 by Additional and Session Judge Sajid Mehmood for killing a man named Nazar Mohammad in 1994 in Okara district. The murder took place over a land dispute and after Ishaq's mercy appeals were rejected by top courts, he was executed in Sahiwal District Jail.
Mohammad Nawaz was hanged in Gujranwala Central Jail for the murder of 25-year-old Mohammad Ehsan Elahi over personal enmity in 1999. The convict was sentenced to death in 2001 by an additional and session judge and after his mercy appeals to the top courts and President of Pakistan were rejected, Sessions Judge Chaudhary Ameer ordered for issuance of his his black warrant and execution.
Pakistan lifted its moratorium on the death penalty in all capital cases on Mar 10.
Initially executions were resumed for terrorism offences only in the wake of a Taliban massacre at an army-run school in Peshawar which had claimed the lives of more than 150 persons, mostly schoolchildren, on December 16, 2014.
The United Nations, the European Union, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have called on Pakistan to re-impose its moratorium on the death penalty.
