ISLAMABAD: Rights organisations on Thursday called on the government to halt the execution of the first civilian for a non-terror related offence since 2008, saying the move would violate its own official policy.

A six-year moratorium on the death penalty was lifted last month in the case of convicted terrorists following a terrorist attack by Taliban militants on a school in Peshawar which killed 150 people.

Since then 20 people have been hanged, with plans to execute up to 500.

But a death warrant issued this week for convicted murderer Shoaib Sarwar has raised the prospect of executions being resumed for the rest of the country's almost 8,000 death row convicts.

Sarwar, a death row prisoner, was convicted on murder charges in 1998,

He is currently being held in a jail in Haripur, some 25 kilometres from Islamabad.

Rights groups have slammed the announcement, which sets the date of his hanging for February 3 in Rawalpindi.

“The government policy on who should be executed is very clear it says only people who are on terrorism,” Kate Higham of British legal charity Reprieve told AFP, adding the judge in this case had misunderstood his role and succumbed to pressure from the victim's family.

Analysts believe that resuming the executions in non-terror cases could imperil a favourable trade agreement with the European Union which exempts Pakistan from taxes on its textile exports.