Pak: Sindh High Court pulls up Police for no progress in missing persons' cases since 2015

Sindh [Pakistan], April 6 : The Sindh High Court (SHC) pulled up Police for not presenting the progress report on the probe regarding missing persons' cases since 2015 and said that police were helpless to collect reports from internment centers in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP), the Dawn reported.

A two-judge bench headed by Justice Naimatullah Phulpoto also deplored that police were submitting stereotype progress reports as there was nothing substantial in such reports, according to Pakistan based Dawn newspaper.

The court noted that the case of a person, who had gone missing in 2015, was discussed before a joint investigation team (JIT) and the provincial task force (PTF) for missing persons around ten times, but no clue yet.

"It is very unfortunate that till today reports from internment centres of the KP have not been collected by the IO. Perhaps, police are helpless in collecting such reports," it added.

According to the bench, such reports from internment centres in other identical cases were also still awaited.

The bench directed the secretaries of the ministries of interior and defense to collect reports from the internment centres in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and submit the same before the court or else appear in person on April 26.

The bench also ordered that the sessions of JIT and PTF needed to be repeated before the next hearing. The lawyer for one of the petitioners informed the court that the family of missing person Syed Tahir Ali was suffering and required financial assistance, according to Dawn.

An additional advocate general (AAG) Sindh submitted that the matter had been taken up for provision of some help. The bench, however, said that mere words were not sufficient and directed the AAG to file a categorical statement in that regard.

The bench passed these orders in two petitions filed in 2015.

Earlier, the Sindh government had sanctioned one-time compensation to the families of 12 missing persons (Rs500,000 per family) whose cases fell within the category of enforced disappearance, according to Dawn.