Hafiz Abdul Basit
Encyclopedia
Hafiz Abdul Basit is a citizen of Pakistan
who is believed to have been detained on suspicion of involvement to assassinate Pakistan's leader President
Pervez Musharraf
.
A devout Muslim, Basit disappeared from his home on January 4, 2004, and was believed to have been taken into covert extrajudicial detention
in a secret Pakistani interrogation center for the next three and a half years. (see also: Missing persons (Pakistan)
)
Tariq Pervez
, the director-general of Pakistan's Federal Investigation Agency
, was threatened with jail, unless he produced Basit.
Pakistani Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad told him:
Pervez claims he was soon transferred to the custody of Pakistan's controversial intelligence agency, the Interservices Intelligence Directorate.
Pervez was allowed two brief, temporary, releases from the Court, to give him an opportunity to be arrange for Hafiz Abdul Basit to be released from his extrajudicial detention -- without success.
Pakistan's Attorney General
Malik Qayyum intervened, and sought a further two day adjournment, taking responsibility for the release of Hafiz Abdul Basit.
Hafiz Abdul Basit had still not been produced, before the Court, on August 22, 2007, when the two-day adjournment expired.
The Pakistani newspaper Dawn
reported that Qayyum told the Supreme Court:
The Supreme Court ordered the 25-year-old Basit be released to his maternal uncle Hafiz Mohammad Nasir.
He was finally released August 22, 2007.
Iftikhar's examination of the circumstances of Hafiz Abdul Basit's detention would trigger a wider inquiry into the practice of Pakistan's Intelligence and Justice organs holding captives in extrajudicial detention.
Iftikhar wrote
The Pakistani Supreme Court is going through a list of 287 disappeared men, one at a time.
The Supreme Court also ordered the release of other men from the list of disappeared, Imran Munir, Alim Nasir, Jan Muhammad, Munir Mengal
and Salim Baloch.
Pakistan
Pakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...
who is believed to have been detained on suspicion of involvement to assassinate Pakistan's leader President
President
A president is a leader of an organization, company, trade union, university, or country.Etymologically, a president is one who presides, who sits in leadership...
Pervez Musharraf
Pervez Musharraf
Pervez Musharraf , is a retired four-star general who served as the 13th Chief of Army Staff and tenth President of Pakistan as well as tenth Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee. Musharraf headed and led an administrative military government from October 1999 till August 2007. He ruled...
.
A devout Muslim, Basit disappeared from his home on January 4, 2004, and was believed to have been taken into covert extrajudicial detention
Extrajudicial detention
Arbitrary or extrajudicial detention is the detention of individuals by a state, without ever laying formal charges against them.Although it has a long history of legitimate use in wartime , detention without charge, sometimes in secret, has been one of the hallmarks of totalitarian states...
in a secret Pakistani interrogation center for the next three and a half years. (see also: Missing persons (Pakistan)
Missing persons (Pakistan)
Missing persons is the term used in Pakistan to refer to the ostensibly hundreds or thousands of people in Pakistan who have been forcefully disappeared. Reports of forced abductions by the Pakistani state first began arising in 2001, in the aftermath of the United States invasion of Afghanistan...
)
Tariq Pervez
Tariq Pervez
Tariq Pervez , a Pakistani policeman, was the director-general of Pakistan's Federal Investigation Agency from 2005 till the end of 2008. After his retirement, he planned to engage in counter-terrorism efforts and might join a think-tank....
, the director-general of Pakistan's Federal Investigation Agency
Federal Investigation Agency
The Federal Investigation Agency is an agency of Pakistan, under the Ministry of Interior, that serves as a federal criminal investigative body with one of the Directorate dealing as Pakistani body of Interpol. It has a wide role in anti-terrorism, anti-fascism, anti-corruption, human smuggling...
, was threatened with jail, unless he produced Basit.
Pakistani Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad told him:
Pervez claims he was soon transferred to the custody of Pakistan's controversial intelligence agency, the Interservices Intelligence Directorate.
Pervez was allowed two brief, temporary, releases from the Court, to give him an opportunity to be arrange for Hafiz Abdul Basit to be released from his extrajudicial detention -- without success.
Pakistan's Attorney General
Attorney General
In most common law jurisdictions, the attorney general, or attorney-general, is the main legal advisor to the government, and in some jurisdictions he or she may also have executive responsibility for law enforcement or responsibility for public prosecutions.The term is used to refer to any person...
Malik Qayyum intervened, and sought a further two day adjournment, taking responsibility for the release of Hafiz Abdul Basit.
Hafiz Abdul Basit had still not been produced, before the Court, on August 22, 2007, when the two-day adjournment expired.
The Pakistani newspaper Dawn
Dawn (newspaper)
Dawn is Pakistan's oldest and most widely read English-language newspaper. One of the country's two largest English-language dailies, it is the flagship of the Dawn Group of Newspapers, published by Pakistan Herald Publications, which also owns the Herald, a magazine, the evening paper The Star and...
reported that Qayyum told the Supreme Court:
The Supreme Court ordered the 25-year-old Basit be released to his maternal uncle Hafiz Mohammad Nasir.
He was finally released August 22, 2007.
Iftikhar's examination of the circumstances of Hafiz Abdul Basit's detention would trigger a wider inquiry into the practice of Pakistan's Intelligence and Justice organs holding captives in extrajudicial detention.
Iftikhar wrote
The Pakistani Supreme Court is going through a list of 287 disappeared men, one at a time.
The Supreme Court also ordered the release of other men from the list of disappeared, Imran Munir, Alim Nasir, Jan Muhammad, Munir Mengal
Munir Mengal
Muni Mengal is the head of Baloch Voice TV, a Balochi language television channel. On 4 April 2006, 3 months before the channel was due to launch, he went missing when he arrived at Karachi Airport from Bahrain. It later became clear that he had been abducted by Pakistani security agencies...
and Salim Baloch.