Pak SC rejects 2 petitions against Saeed's release

Rezaul H Laskar

Islamabad, July 6 (PTI) Pakistan Supreme Court Monday
rejected on technical grounds two petitions by authorities
against the release of Jamaat-ud-Dawah (JuD) chief Hafiz Mohd
Saeed, a key accused in the Mumbai attacks, from house arrest,
prompting a top official to announce that the pleas would be
filed again Tuesday after removing the "flaws".

The petitions, submitted on Saturday by the federal and
Punjab governments, were rejected by the office of the Supreme
Court registrar this afternoon due to technical flaws, sources
said.

Deputy Attorney General Shah Khawar told reporters the
petitions would be submitted again tomorrow after removing the
technical flaws.

He said the registrar had returned the petitions as they
challenged only the release of Saeed and his close aide Col
(retd) Nazir Ahmed on the orders of the Lahore High Court.
The office of the registrar said two other JuD leaders --
Amir Hamza and Mufti Abdur Rehman -- who were originally party
to the matter should also be included in the petitions, Khawar
said.

Hamza and Rehman, detained along with Saeed in December
last year in the wake of the Mumbai attacks, were freed by a
judicial review board in May. Acting on a petition filed by
the JuD chief, the Lahore High Court ordered the release of
Saeed and Ahmed on June 2.

Khawar said: "We are not satisfied with the judgement of
the High Court on the grounds that the relevant law in the
Constitution which regulates preventive detention...has not
been properly appreciated.

"Another important ground is that the resolution of the
United Nations Security Council (declaring the JuD a terrorist
organisation) has not been properly interpreted and we believe
that was also a sufficient ground for the detention."
The federal government's petition said the High Court had
"not considered the sensitivity of the case" in the context of
Pakistan's ongoing campaign against "internal and external
terrorism."

The High Court had also ignored "the true import of the
UN Security Council resolutions in respect of JuD" and Saeed,
the petition said.It also said the government had "classified information
which could be made the basis of (a) detention order."

The government's action appeared to be aimed at clearing
the air before meetings of the Foreign Secretaries and Prime
Ministers of India and Pakistan on the sidelines of a
Non-Aligned Movement summit in Egypt later this month. PTI RHL
RAI