Pak SC clears release of man who tried to assassinate Musharraf

ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court of Pakistan has rejected a plea filed against the release of Rana Mohammad Naveed, the convict in the assassination attempt case on former Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf.

The three-judge bench headed by Justice Sardar Tariq Masood kept the previous ruling of the Lahore High Court that the petitioner is entitled to a pre-conviction period in detention and general remissions under the Army Act, 1952 of Pakistan, the Dawn reported.

The lawyer of the petitioner gave a statement to the Dawn that this ruling will finally result in the immediate release of Naveed as he has already spent 20 years in jail against a jail sentence of 14 years. Prior to this the top court in 2005 had reduced Rana's death sentence to life imprisonment.

A similar ruling from a different bench of LHC had come in 2015 for another convict Adnan Khan who was another convict with Naveed. At that time the court had allowed a pre-conviction period in detention and remissions under the Field General Court Martial.

This was also considered in the ruling that was delivered by the Supreme court regarding Rana's release, according to The Dawn. On December 26, 2003, then-President Pervez Musharraf narrowly escaped an assassination attempt.

At that time 16 people were killed including six policemen and four army soldiers. Musharraf however escaped harm as he was in an armoured car. Nine police personnel were also injured in the 1attempted assassination besides several other people.

A van and a car tried to hit the motorcade of Musharraf in the incident. One of these vehicles hit the first vehicle in the motorcade and the second hit the last one. The first explosion was at 1:42 pm and the second one occurred just a minute later.

Each vehicle in the blast carried 40 kgs of explosives. This destroyed around 15 vehicles other than the attacker's vehicles. The incident came after Musharraf escaped three earlier attempts on his life.