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ISLAMABAD: Bitterly disappointed with agencies over the non-production of seven suspects who had been taken into custody by intelligence agencies for their alleged involvement in several cases of terrorism, the Supreme Court ordered the ISI, MI, Judge Advocate General (JAG) Branch and the chief secretary of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa on Friday to ensure presence of these prisoners by Monday.
“When the prime minister can come to the Supreme Court then everyone will come,” Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry observed, while heading a three-judge bench.
The bench was expecting production of seven prisoners of the 11 men who mysteriously went missing Rawalpindi’s Adilyala jail gate the day they had been acquitted of terrorism charges in 2010.
Of these 11 prisoners, four are admitted to the Lady Reading Hospital with a number of ailments while three of them are in the Internment Centre in Parachinar established under Actions (in Aid of Civil Power) Regulation, 2011. Four prisoners died in custody of intelligence agencies.
On Jan 6, 2011, the court disposed of a joint petition on the assurance that the prisoners would face the Field General Court Martial (FGCM) under the Army Act, 1952.
The whereabouts of the prisoners were revealed when intelligence agencies finally conceded before the Supreme Court that the 11 men were in the custody of two premier spy agencies and asserted that the two agencies had found them in terror camps.
The prisoners are wanted by intelligence agencies in connection with different acts of terrorism, including an attack on the GHQ, a rocket attack on the Pakistan Aeronautical Complex Kamra, bomb blasts at the Rawalpindi Parade Lane mosque, shots fired from anti-aircraft guns on a plane carrying former President Pervez Musharraf, suicide attacks on a bus of an intelligence agency in Rawalpindi and other attacks on different military installations and killing of a number of senior army personnel.
When the Supreme Court resumed on Friday the hearing of a petition of Ms Ruhaifa, the mother of three civilian brothers picked up by the agencies (one of the brother was later found dead), Advocate Raja Muhammad Irshad representing the DG-ISI, DG-MI and JAG branch again came empty handed.
The Supreme Court which was not in a mood to listen to any excuses made it clear to the counsel either to name the person who was hampering the production of these men before the Supreme Court or produce them without fail.
In the evening when the court resumed proceedings, Attorney General Maulvi Anwarul Haq told the bench that in the absence of the counsel of the military the suspects, who were in Parachinar, could not be brought to the court because they had to cover a long distance. He assured the court that those who were at the Lady Reading Hospital in Peshawar would be brought along with them.
At this the court issued a notice to the KP governor through the chief secretary who will appear in person on Monday to inform the court whether the Oversight Board in terms of Article 14 of the regulation had been constituted. The chief secretary would also procure a report from the board whether its members had visited the persons detained in the internment centre to ascertain their condition.
At about the same time, journalists rushed to the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences amid reports that suspects might be brought to the hospital for a medical check-up and treatment. Instead, they found a large number of policemen in plain clothes at hospital premises. They waited for over two hours, but the prisoners were not brought there although the hospital administration was on high alert for extending medical treatment to them.
