ISLAMABAD, Dec 13: A new law to deal with the emotive issue of enforced disappearances is on the anvil and is likely to reach the Prime Minister’s office in a week or two.
A source privy to the development said a draft of the law had already been endorsed by the federal task force constituted on July 24 to devise a national policy on the issue of missing persons.
“The draft bill is ready and will be presented to the interior secretary,” the source said, adding that it would be placed before the prime minister for approval and then in parliament.
Under the new law containing 12 recommendations, enforced disappearance will be considered a criminal offence. However, a breathing space will be provided to the armed forces and intelligence agencies by allowing them to keep under preventive detention for a longer period an individual suspected of involvement in terrorist acts.
“It is a demand of the armed forces and intelligence agencies to strengthen their hands by equipping them with the authority to detain a person for an extended period,” the source said, adding that security forces in Singapore were legally empowered to detain suspects for almost a year.
The preventive detention laws as well as the newly introduced law Protection of Pakistan Ordinance 2013 allow 90 days of captivity.
The reason being given by the defence authorities, and taken into consideration by the task force, the source said, was that they knew the identity and activities of suspects but did not have enough evidence which could stand the test of legal proceedings in a court of law.
Consequently, a number of terrorists were acquitted by courts and they later rejoined their outfits with renewed vigour and motivation.
The detention for a longer period would help the establishment or forces to interrogate suspects and glean solid evidence against them, the source said, adding that their known whereabouts would also ensure their safety and health.
Citing a report the source said that 103 rape cases had been registered over the past five years in Islamabad, but not a single accused was convicted. When the rape accused could not be punished how it would be possible to prove allegations of terrorism against someone.
One of the recommendations calls for granting blanket immunity to security forces accused of lifting a person if they come up with complete evidence and disclosure. Though sad, the chapter of missing persons’ saga has to be closed which is possible only by giving immunity to the forces. Otherwise, the source said, nobody would come forward to disclose the whereabouts of missing persons.
And for the missing people whose whereabouts are still not known because of various reasons, their family members will be compensated by the state to ease their sufferings. “We are on a road to solve this very touchy and sensitive problem,” the source said.
The source disputed the figures of missing persons and said these stood at 850, including those from Balochistan. Many of them are either in 27 internment centres set up under the Action (in Aid of Civil Power) Regulations 2001 (21 in Fata and six in Pata) or in 102 jails in different cities. Very few are with the defence authorities.
Referring to a decision by the defence ministry to seek review of the Dec 10 verdict of the Supreme Court in the 35 missing persons’ case, the source said what worried the military establishment most was a direction in the judgment that “the court may also ascertain the intention of the executive that why it is not discouraging such practices which amount to serious crimes against humanity”.
Coming from the highest court in the country this was a very dangerous and problematic observation, the source said, adding that Germany’s Adolf Hitler was tried under these allegations.