KARACHI: An antiterrorism court remanded on Friday a suspect in police custody in Naqeebullah Mehsud murder case till April 21.

The then SSP Malir Rao Anwar along with his 10 detained and 15 absconding subordinates has been booked for allegedly abducting Naseemullah, better known as Naqeebullah Mehsud, for ransom and killing him along with three others in an alleged staged encounter on Jan 13 in a Malir locality and dubbing them as militants.

The newly-appointed investigating officer SSP Dr Rizwan produced Sharjeel Feroze before the ATC-II and contended that he was a gunman of absconding Shah Latif Town SHO Amanullah Marwat.

He sought the custody of the suspect for questioning and to arrest Marwat and other policemen.

Suspect is said to be a gunman of absconding Shah Latif Town SHO

The court handed him over to police on physical remand till April 21 and directed the IO to produce him again along with progress report at the next hearing.

On March 22, the same court had remanded Rao Anwar in police custody for a month in the present case while the then DSP Qamar Ahmed Shaikh, sub-inspector Mohammad Yasin, assistant sub-inspectors Supurd Hussain and Allahyar, head constables Khizar Hayat and Mohammad Iqbal, and constables Arshad Ali, Shafiq Ahmed, Abdul Ali and Ghulam Nazak have already been remanded to prison.

The then Shah Latif Town SHO Amanullah Marwat, SHO of the SITE Superhighway police station Annar Khan, then Sohrab Goth SHO Shoaib Shaikh, alias Shoaib Shooter, and around a dozen other police officials are still at large.

The Supreme Court had taken notice of the killing after the incident sparked outrage on social media and protests by political, religious and rights organisations while the provincial police officer had also constituted a three-member inquiry committee that found Rao Anwar and his associates involved in the case and said that prima facie the encounter in question was fake.

Published in Dawn, April 14th, 2018