KARACHI, Feb 7: An additional district and sessions court (south) was told on Saturday that the interior ministry had collected all the relevant data about the former chairman of the Ehtesab Bureau, his brother and two senior police officers, who had been declared proclaimed offenders in a 1999 case related to an alleged attempt on Asif Ali Zardari’s life, to share it with Interpol so that the international police agency could execute red warrants and arrest the four absconders.

This piece of information was shared with the court by public prosecutor Abdul Maroof, who cited a report submitted by the interior minister following directives from the court, which had in September 2008 declared former Ehtesab Bureau chairman Saifur Rehman, his brother Mujibur Rehman, former Sindh police chief Rana Maqbool, DIG Farooq Amin Qureshi and former SP of the Karachi Central Prison Najaf Mirza proclaimed offenders and asked the authorities concerned to contact Interpol for the issuance of red warrants over the alleged attempt on the life of Mr Zardari, who was then in jail custody.

The court, which in its last hearing offered 20 days to the interior ministry to submit a report about progress on its orders, gave another month to the authorities concerned and ordered them to come up with detailed facts on March 7, 2009.

The judge, Hafeeza Usman, also extended the hearing on a pre-arrest bail application moved by one of the accused, Najaf Mirza, till March 7.

The court had already issued non-bailable warrants for the arrest of the five accused, but police failed to arrest any of them. In one of the hearings the police submitted before the court that the warrants could not be executed as two of the accused were abroad while the others had gone into hiding. The police were finding it difficult to track down the accused.

However, the court refused to accept the report and warned the officer that warrants for his arrest could be issued for misleading the court. Later, on the request of the public prosecutor the court ordered the DIG for investigation to appear on Sept 30 to submit a compliance report with regard to the service of the NBWs the court had issued for the eighth time.

According to the prosecution, the respondents were accused by Mr Zardari of unlawfully obtaining his physical custody from an anti-terrorism court on the night between May 15 and May 16, 1999, taking him to the CIA centre and torturing him to extract incriminatory statements. His tongue was slashed and he bled profusely, but the police refused to register an FIR against the then IG and covered up the incident as an attempt to commit suicide by the victim.

In Saturday’s hearing, the ministry of interior showed progress on the court orders through its report, as the public prosecutor said he had gathered all the necessary data in line with the requirements of Interpol before it issued red warrants for the arrest of the wanted accused.

The court was told that photographs, fingerprints and perpetual warrants for the arrest of the four accused – Saifur Rehman, his brother Mujibur Rehman, former Sindh police chief Rana Maqbool and DIG Farooq Amin Qureshi – had been obtained from the institutions concerned and the ministry was in contact with Interpol to fulfil its requirements.

An FIR for an attempt on Mr Zardari’s life was registered in February 2005 after former Malir district and sessions judge Salman Ansari, holding a judicial inquiry into the incident on the order of the high court, found that the wounds inside Mr Zardari’s mouth and other parts of his body could not be self-inflicted.

Though the seventh additional district and sessions judge (south) disposed of the case under Section 173 of the Criminal Procedure Code, suggesting that the proceedings were quashed because of the absence of evidence in June 2006, Mr Zardari moved a revision application against the orders before the Sindh High Court, which in May 2008 reopened the case and directed the trial court to initiate hearing of a murder attempt case.