'Fourth civilian facing court martial under Pak Army Act for GHQ attack dies mysteriously'

Islamabad, Jan 21 (ANI): A fourth civilian facing a court martial under the Pakistan Army Act on charges of attacking the GHQ and ISI Hamza camp died mysteriously on Friday, a brother of the deceased has claimed.

The Dawn quoted Abdul Saboor's brother Mufti Shakoor as saying that an unknown caller had asked him to collect the body of his brother from the Haji camp in Peshawar.

Shakoor said that the caller initially asked him to go to the Peshawar hospital, but later informed him to collect Abdul's body from an ambulance parked near the Haji camp.

He said he found the body on the GT Road near the camp, but by that time, the cellphone of the caller had been switched off.

Twenty-nine-year-old Abdul Saboor is the fourth civilian detained in the case to have died in mysterious circumstances over the past six months.

Mohammad Aamir died on August 15 last year, Tahseen Ullah on December 17, and Said Arab on December 18. Their bodies were recovered from the Lady Reading Hospital in Peshawar.

The deceased was reportedly picked up by intelligence agencies on November 25, 2007, along with his younger brothers Abdul Basit and Abdul Majid from Lahore.

On April 8, 2008, Aamir, Arab, Ullah, Mazharul Haq, Shafigur Rehman, Mohammad Shafiq, and Gul Roze were acquitted by the Anti-Terrorism Court in Rawalpindi after the prosecution failed to make a case against them.

However, before their release, the Rawalpindi DCO issued a detention order under the Maintenance of Public Order Ordinance. On May 6, 2010, it was extended for 90 days by the Punjab home secretary, but it was set aside by the Lahore High Court's Rawalpindi bench on May 28, 2010.

The Superintendent of Adiyala jail, Saeedulllah Gondal, is reported to have handed over the detainees to the ISI and the MI.

In May, 2011, however, the advocate general informed the apex court that the detainees had been formally arrested in the first week of April and a case under Section 2 (1) (d) of the Pakistan Army Act, 1952, was registered against them. (ANI)