Pakistan: Let's solve this once and for all, says Chief Justice

ISLAMABAD: Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Qazi Faez Isa said that the Pakistani Supreme Court wanted to solve the problem of missing persons and enforced disappearances "once and for all", Dawn reported on Tuesday.

He made these remarks when a three-member bench -- comprising the CJP, Justice Musarrat Hilali, and Justice Muhammad Ali Mazhar -- heard a set of petitions against missing persons. One of the pleas included an application filed by former senator and senior lawyer Aitzaz Ahsan.

"This country belongs to all of us, even those who may have other points of view," he said. "This matter will only be resolved when we all work together and take responsibility. Let's make Pakistan strong from within.

If Pakistan is strong from within, no outside forces can touch it". Advocate Shoaib Shaheen appeared on behalf of Ahsan and urged the apex court to accept the instant petition and declare that enforced disappearances are "violative of, inter alia, Articles 4 (right of individuals to be dealt with in accordance with law, etc), 9 (security of person), 10 (safeguards as to arrest and detention), 14 (inviolability of dignity of man, etc), 19 (freedom of speech, etc) and 25 (equality of citizens) of the Constitution. He further requested the top court to declare that the Commission of Inquiry on Enforced Disappearances "does not adequately comply with legal and international standards", Dawn reported.

The lawyer mentioned how political activists were "kidnapped" and forced to change their parties. "Are you upset that they left the PTI?" Justice Isa asked. "Should we tell them to come back to the PTI? We don't have a solution to this.

For his part, Shaheen said the matter of enforced disappearances in Balochistan had also been mentioned in the petition. He further recalled that a bill regarding the same presented by former human rights minister Shireen Mazari had "gone missing".

At one point, the lawyer stated that Dr Deen Muhammad Baloch, a Baloch physical and politician, had been missing for 14 years and his family had filed applications in both courts and with the police.

However, there was no trace of him for years. "Moreover, Baloch students have been subjected to short-term disappearances, being picked up, kept in secret detention facilities and released several days later," Shaheen highlighted.

He also claimed that there were "serious allegations" against the state in every third case of missing persons.

Here, Justice Isa said that when he was the chief justice of the Balochistan High Court, cases pertaining to missing persons were heard every Tuesday and recoveries were made, Dawn reported.

"I am surprised that there was a sit-in in Islamabad, but there was no mention of it in the petition," he noted. "You could have filed another petition, this way facts could have come before us".

The CJP also stated that a list should have been provided of missing persons, name-wise and date-wise. In his response, the lawyer said the inquiry commission had been made a respondent in the case and they would provide the report/details on missing persons.

Justice Isa asked if the members of the inquiry commission had been changed after it was first formed. "From 2011 to 2023, the commission has not been changed," Shaheen replied, to which the CJP promised to find a solution to the matter.

The top judge said he wanted to look at the number of people missing since 2001. "You should provide year-wise data," Justice Mazhar remarked.

According to Dawn, Justice Isa also urged Shaheen against making the matter political, noting that some people were completely ignored in the petition.

"This is a public interest matter we have taken notice of. God willing, we will move to resolve it," he said, adding that everyone had a right to protest.

Further, the CJP said the Attorney General for Pakistan be told to appear before the court tomorrow and briefed on today's proceedings.

Meanwhile, Baloch protesters have called for a shutterdown demonstration across the country tomorrow (January 3), saying that state officials were trying to label the Baloch long march and sit-in in Islamabad as "propaganda".

"The state has consistently shown a half-hearted and uncommitted concern regarding our demands from the beginning," the Baloch Yakjehti Committee, organizer of the protest demanding an end to enforced disappearances and extra-judicial killings in Balochistan, said in a social media post.

Baloch protesters, who have been camping outside the National Press Club for over a week now, had on December 28 given the government a seven-day ultimatum to fulfill their demands which include the release of all protesters detained during police action, detailed investigation into rights violations in Balochistan, elimination of enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings, the release of all victims of enforced disappearances, restrictions on the Counter-Terrorism Department (CTD) and elimination of "state-sponsored death squads," Dawn reported.