DAWN.COM

Today's Paper | May 02, 2024

Published 09 Feb, 2012 11:30pm

Eight more missing people die in mysterious circumstances

ISLAMABAD: Forty one Pakistanis disappeared under mysterious circumstances have been traced out while eight of them have died, the government said in a report.

The government told the Commission of Inquiry on Enforced Disappearances, headed by retired judge Javed Iqbal, that many of the disappeared people were still in the custody of country’s law enforcement agencies.

Though authorities mentioned names of the dead but they did not say causes and circumstances of their death.

A copy of the report available to the Dawn.com disclosed that six were from northwestern Swat valley where Pakistan army launched an operation against militants in 2007. They included Abdul Laiq, his brother Mohammad Laiq, Moazmeen Khan, Pervaiz Khan, Zor Talab Khan, Lahore Khan.

Whereas, Shahid Mehmood and Wadera Jalab were from Attock-Punjab and district Kohlu of Balochistan respectively.

Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry has recently opened a case of another eleven out of them four men had died in the custody of intelligence agencies.

The relatives of the deceased filed a petition in the court after they found their bodies in a hospital in northwestern city of Peshawar. The remaining seven are still with the agencies.

Six out of eight mentioned above are also unique cases as the District Police Officer, Swat has also mentioned in his report that the families of all the deceased have already been paid the compensation amount however the exact sum of money is not mentioned in the report.

On the other hand the District Police Officer of Attock and Political Agent of BMP, DG Khan , did not mention a word about  whether the families of deceased Shahid Mehmood and Wadera Jalab respectively have been paid compensation or not.

“We were already shocked about the killing of four people kidnapped from Adyala Jail, Rawalpindi this new information has increased our sorrow and grief,” said Amina Masud Janjua the iron lady struggling for the release of her own husband and the other missing people across the country.

In this regard when this correspondent contacted Farid Khan, the Secretary of the Commission of Enquiry on Enforced Disappearances, he claimed that these were the cases of dead people mentioned in the latest report by the commission and were very old cases.

Pakistani intelligence agencies are under severe criticism by human rights groups and media for detaining and torturing people “unlawfully”.

Read Comments

Pakistan's 'historic' lunar mission to be launched on Friday aboard China lunar probe Next Story