PESHAWAR, July 19: Peshawar High Court Chief Justice Dost Mohammad Khan inaugurated Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Judicial Academy here on Thursday, saying that the academy was first of its kind in the country which would impart training to all stakeholders related to judicial system.

He said on the occasion that the academy would play its role in de-radicalisation of the society, particularly focusing on youth in rural areas entrapped by militants and destabilising the state and writ of the government. He said that the proposed FM radio and TV channel of the academy would also be used for this purpose.

“Without the rule of law, national survival is not possible, nor would we be able to send an olive branch to international community to ensure peace and justice,” he said.

The academy has been set up on the premises of old sessions court, an over a century old building situated opposite Peshawar Central Prison and in close vicinity of Peshawar High Court, Governor’s House, Civil Secretariat etc.

The chief justice distributed commendation certificates among several people, including labourers, masons, gardeners, and officers, who made functioning of the academy possible in three months.

Director general of the academy Hayat Ali Shah and dean faculty Dr Khursheed Iqbal made presentations about different aspects of the academy and its future programmes.

They said that the academy would be unique because it would impart training to all stakeholders and persons relevant to judiciary, including police, investigators, lawyers and prosecution, probation, reclamation and prison staff etc while other academies in the country had been imparting training to judicial officers only.

The chief justice said that soon after assuming charge of his office on Nov 17 last year he put establishment of the academy on his priority list and within one and a half months he managed to get the academy established by an Act of the provincial assembly.

“A backward province, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa faces deterioration of its institutions. The legal and judicial institutions are not exceptions,” the chief justice said. “Added to this was the emergence of a culture of radicalism that compelled our young generation to live in a hellfire right from their childhood to their youth,” he said.