RAWALPINDI, April 25: After securing permission from an anti-terrorism court (ATC) here, the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) formally arrested former president Pervez Musharraf on Thursday and interrogated him in the Benazir Bhutto murder case.

However, retired Gen Musharraf expressed lack of confidence in the joint investigation team (JIT) constituted by former interior minister Rehman Malik.

The Lahore High Court’s Rawalpindi bench had dismissed on Wednesday a plea for pre-arrest bail of Gen Musharraf after his counsel, citing security concerns, did not appear to argue in the case.

FIA’s Special Prosecutor Chaudhry Zulfiqar Ali presented before ATC judge Chaudhry Habibur Rehman on Thursday the LHC order dismissing the bail petition.

He said the court should allow the FIA to arrest Gen Musharraf because his custody was required for interrogation in the murder case.

The FIA, however, suggested that due to security concerns Gen Musharraf might be kept in his Chak Shahzad farmhouse which had been declared a sub-jail.

The ATC allowed the FIA to arrest Gen Musharraf and keep him in the sub-jail.

According to FIA sources, JIT officials visited the farmhouse after the curt orders and formally arrested him in the Benazir murder case.

The JIT also put some questions to the former army chief but he did not provide satisfactory answers, the sources said.

However, Gen Musharraf’s counsel Barrister Salman Safdar said the team had not questioned the former president. “Unless the FIA takes physical custody of Mr Musharraf, it cannot interrogate him,” he said.

He said Gen Musharraf had no confidence in the JIT because it had been constituted by Mr Malik and the former PPP government wanted to drag him into what he termed were false cases. The former government had also implicated him in several other cases, the lawyer said.

He said Gen Musharraf would file a petition for constitution of a new JIT because some members of the current team had made political statements against him.

Barrister Safdar said Mr Malik was in charge of Ms Bhutto’s security and she had died because of his negligence. In order to hide crucial facts he had constituted the JIT comprising handpicked officers, he alleged.

He said Gen Musharraf had been implicated in the case because of suspicions of Ms Bhutto, but before her death she had also said she suspected three other persons -- Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi, former deputy prime minister in the PPP-led coalition government; former Inter-Services (ISI) director general Hameed Gul and former Intelligence Bureau chief Ijaz Shah. The FIA had neither implicated any of them nor recorded their statements, he said.

He claimed that the FIA had no expertise in investigating murder cases. “Although murder is a scheduled offence in the FIA Act, the agency generally investigates financial matters and human trafficking cases,” he said.

The lawyer alleged that the investigation of the murder case had been transferred to the FIA to mess up facts.

He said he would request the court to quash the entire investigation by the JIT against Gen Musharraf in the case.