ISLAMABAD: The verdict announced by an Anti-Terrorism Court (ATC) in Rawalpindi on Thursday in the Benazir Bhutto assassination case has become controversial as not only the Pakistan Peoples Party but also other stakeholders have rejected it.

Since the PPP was not a party to the case, it demanded that the government immediately file an appeal against the verdict.

Ms Bhutto was assassinated in a gun-and-bomb attack after she addressed a public meeting at Liaquat Bagh on Dec 27, 2007. The then government of Gen Pervez Musharraf had claimed that she was killed by the Baitullah Mehsud group of the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP).

The ATC acquitted five TTP suspects and sentenced former police officers Saud Aziz and Khurram Shahzad to 17-year imprisonment.

Call to unmask planners of assassination

The court also declared former president retired Gen Pervez Musharraf an absconder in the case. It had named him in the case in February 2011.

Gen Musharraf’s political party All Pakistan Muslim League (APML) has also decided to challenge the verdict.

The PPP said: “The party believes that justice has not been done, nor it seems to have been done.”

PPP chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari rejected the verdict and said in his tweet: “Shaheed Mohtrma Benazir Bhutto case’s decision is disappointing and unacceptable. Release of terrorists not only unjust but also dangerous. PPP will explore legal options.”

A PPP spokesman said the acquittal of Al Qaeda/Taliban terrorists against whom evidence had been provided was most surprising and raised several questions. “On its face it seems a triumph for Al Qaeda militants,” he added.

The spokesman said two police officers had been sentenced but the question as to who had ordered them to wash out the place of occurrence and destroy crucial evidence had not been addressed.

“The conviction of the police officers will remain weak unless those giving orders to them were also tried and convicted,” he said.

The PPP recalled the apprehensions expressed by Ms Bhutto about the plot to assassinate her. “It is common knowledge and she had stated it in so many words that Musharraf had threatened her that if she returned to Pakistan before elections her life would be in danger,” the spokesman said.

He said the PPP would give a detailed response after the detailed judgement had been made public by the court.

Rejecting the verdict, the APML wondered how Gen Musharraf was declared an absconder in the case. “The decision does not fulfil the requirement of justice,” the party’s secretary general Dr Mohammad Amjad said in a statement.

He claimed that the judgement was contradictory to the charges, evidence and statements made in the case. “It seems that the decision was given under fear and pressure.”

Dr Amjad said the verdict had protected real culprits by acquitting five main accused in the case despite their confession. “Those who were responsible for the assassination will benefit,” he said.

“Earlier it was informed that Gen Musharraf’s case had been separated from the main case, but the verdict reflected that it was given in haste,” he said.

Dr Amjad said sentences of seven to 10 years of imprisonment awarded to the former senior police officers were also against the norms of justice.

He said his party would challenge the verdict and hoped that it would get justice from the superior courts.

Dr Amjad justified hosing down of the venue of the attack and said due to power of the bomb explosion no evidence could have been collected from the venue even if it had not been washed.

Ms Bhutto’s close aide Naheed Khan and her husband Safdar Abbasi (who have been expelled from the PPP) said that after 10 years of investigation into Benazir Bhutto’s assassination, the case was standing at a place from where the probe had started. They also rejected the verdict, saying it had not fixed responsibility of killers and planners of the assassination.

Senator Sherry Rehman tweeted: “What a travesty of Justice #BenazirBeqasoor” and “After ten years the real perpetrators were let off. What a terrible travesty of Justice #SMBBCase.”

Published in Dawn, September 1st, 2017