PESHAWAR, May 21: Chairperson of the Defence of Human Rights Amna Masood Janjua and chairman of the World Prisoners Relief Commission Jawed Ibraheem Paracha have alleged that about 2,500 people have been picked by intelligence agencies, including some government employees and army officials.

They were addressing a joint press conference here at the press club. The two speakers — flanked by scores of relatives of the missing people — said that after 9/11 hundreds of people had disappeared, adding that the practice had been condemned by various human rights organisations, including the Amnesty International.

He said that agencies had been picking up innocent people from their offices, residences and markets, adding that their only crime was that they were devoted Muslims. “Most missing people either vanish or the secret agencies leave them in a paralysed condition,” stated Mr Paracha, former MNA who is pursuing cases of scores of people arrested during the US-led war on terror.

Relatives of the missing people narrated their ordeal on the occasion. Some of the women broke into tears during the process.

Mr Janjua stated that her husband, Masood Janjua, and his friend Faisal Faraz were picked up from a bus stand in Rawalpindi on July 30, 2005. “I started the movement for the recovery of my husband and missing persons on Sept 1, 2006 and my movement will continue until the agencies release the last of them,” she remarked.

She said that that her organisation had submitted three different lists of missing persons in the Supreme Court.

The first list included 43 people, the second comprised 60 names while the third one mentioned names of 158 people. She added that names of 140 missing persons had been given in the petition filed by the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan.

Mrs Janjua claimed that she was now receiving threats from anonymous callers. “Families of missing persons are passing through miseries and their children now have no access to education,” she added.

She said that a scientist of the Atomic Energy Commission from Abbottabad, Atiqur Rehman, was also among the missing. He was allegedly picked up on his wedding day.

Mufti Munir Shakir’s son, Abdullah, told reporters that he and his father were arrested by secret agencies from Karachi airport about a year ago.

He said that officials had kept him separate from his father and tried to force him to write a declaration, acknowledging his father’s purported links with Al Qaeda.

He said that he was released two months ago, but his father was still in the custody of the secret agencies without any case.

Earlier, relatives of the missing people held a protest demonstration in front of the Peshawar High Court and the Peshawar Press Club. Protesters, including women and children, were holding placards and banners demanding their relatives’ recovery.