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Execution and Conviction of Terrorists

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Execution and Conviction of Terrorists Table of Contents INTRODUCTION .................................................................................1 METHODOLOGY .................................................................................2 LIMITATIONS .....................................................................................3 DATA COLLECTION ............................................................................3 PURPOSE/OBJECTIVE ........................................................................3 CATEGORIES OF TRIAL COURTS .......................................................4 PEOPLE CONVICTED THROUGH DIFFERENT TRIAL COURTS ..................................... 4 CATEGORIES OF CONVICTED EXECUTIONS .....................................5 CONVICTED TERRORISTS EXECUTED THROUGH THE DECISIONS OF TRIAL COURTS ...... 6 Executions: Monthly Data for 2014-2015 ............................................... 7 Executions: Province-Based Data ........................................................... 8 Executions: City-Based Data ................................................................... 9 LIST OF ALL CONVICTED PEOPLE EXECUTED IN PAKISTAN SINCE DECEMBER 2014 .............................................................................. 10 PEOPLE PROSECUTED UNDER MILITARY COURTS ...................... 21 EXECUTION AND CONVICTION OF TERRORISTS: A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF MILITARY VERSUS CIVILIAN COURTS IN PAKISTAN by M. Suleman Shahid INTRODUCTION On December 16, 2014, terrorists attacked the Army Public School Peshawar, as a result of which 149 people - mostly school children and teaching staff - were martyred. The shock of this horrific incident was felt in the entire world, and compelled the civilian and military leadership of the country to take every possible action to dismantle this menace permanently. In this context, the very next day the Prime Minister of Pakistan lifted the moratorium on death penalty in terror-related cases, with the approval and consensus of other major political parties. On December 24, 2014, an All Parties Conference (APC) meeting was held in Peshawar, chaired by the Prime Minister Mian Nawaz Sharif himself; the meeting concluded with a unanimous agreement by all political parties on a twenty-point ‘National Action Plan (NAP)’ to curb the threat of terrorism from the country. The first two points of this document are very important and continue to be debated at different fora. These points are “to execute to enforce executions for terrorists sentenced to death” and that “special trial courts will be established under military officers so such elements can be dealt with without delay.” Intrinsically, there are two purposes for lifting the death penalty moratorium in terrorism-related cases and creating a National Action Plan. The first is to execute 1 all inmates convicted of involvement in terrorist activities, so that the state may be able to convey a very strong message to any entities challenging its writ. The second purpose is to implement these sentences as soon as possible through speedy trial courts, as the current civilian courts, even Anti-Terrorists Courts (ATCs), face many challenges within a weak system that has oft forced them to release many terrorists due to incomplete evidences or a flawed prosecution process. Against this backdrop, on December 19, 2014 Pakistan carried out its first executions in ten years, and hung Dr Usman and Arshad Mahmood in Faisalabad Central Jail. Both had been convicted by military courts for their involvement in the attack on Army GHQ and the assassination attempts on former President General Pervez Musharraf. On March 10, 2015, the Interior Ministry of Pakistan lifted its moratorium on death penalty in all capital cases. In this context, the Interior Ministry directed Provincial Governments to proceed with the execution of prisoners who had exhausted all avenues of appeal and clemency. METHODOLOGY The report is based on secondary data carefully collected from print media. This data is related to all the executions that have taken place in Pakistan since December, 2014. Qualitative analysis has been made cross-sectionally as well as longitudinally. The cross-section analysis answers the question of comparative efficiency of the civil and military courts. The question as to whether the civilian courts can perform in the terrorism-related cases efficiently is also deliberated in this section. The data is represented in pie charts; these show a positive trend in the performance of these civilian courts. However, when the time dimension is reviewed, the data indicates a reverse trend and favors the military courts. Likewise, when the number of ‘substantial’ terrorists is quantified, the judgments trend favors military courts. 2 This data has been mainly categorized into three different sections i.e. first category is related to the types of court - military court, civilian courts or ATCs - that have convicted and/or ordered the executions in terrorism-related cases. The second category separates the executions of terrorists from other criminals, and indicates which court ordered which executions. The third category is related to monthly and province-based data for these executions. LIMITATIONS All data has been collected from open-source print media. Therefore it may not be complete, as some information regarding many executions has either not been disclosed or published by the print media. Furthermore, due to constraints and limitations on some information, bits and pieces are either unknown or unconfirmed. This report is not an attempt to justify the argument that questions the constitutionality of the establishment of military courts by the government. Rather, it relates to the performance of the various courts based on data analysis. DATA COLLECTION All data has been collected from secondary sources; mainly from newspapers. In this regard, mainstream print media like Dawn, Express Tribune, The Nation, The News and Daily Times provided fruitful information and data for this report. PURPOSE/OBJECTIVE The purpose of this report is to scrutinize the efficiency of the country’s various trial courts like the Civilian Courts, Anti-Terrorism Courts (ATCs) and military courts via court-martial laws. Since its announcement, a debate has been initiated inside and outside Pakistan on the newly established military courts after 21st amendment that new military courts under 21st amendment are workable or not and why the civilian court could not deal the terror related cases. In this regard, this report 3 analyzes the previous conviction records of trial courts of the country in terror related cases. CATEGORIES OF TRIAL COURTS PEOPLE CONVICTED THROUGH DIFFERENT TRIAL COURTS Up till June 16, 2015, more than a 100 inmates that had been convicted by the various courts – military, civilian courts and ATCs – have been hung across the country. In this context, 35 percent of the convicted who have been executed were sentenced by civilian courts such as the session courts, district courts etc. Courts of Prosecution Not Confirmed 40, Military Courts , 10, 7% 30% ATC, 37, Civilian Courts , 46, 28% 35% Military Courts ATC Civilian Courts Not Confirmed Likewise, another 28 percent were convicted by the ATCs, and 7 percent from military courts via court-martials, while the convictions of another 30 percent could not be identified through the existent database of available sources. This chart shows the total number of cases, and indicates a trend within the sentencing which favors the civilian courts. However, the case becomes more questionable once the nature of the cases is analyzed more closely, as during these trials anti-terror laws were also applied to other related cases which are considered separate from the cases of ‘hardcore terrorism’. The next section categorizes these cases, and is visually explained in the following charts. 4 CATEGORIES OF CONVICTED EXECUTIONS The basic purpose of NAP and the lifting of the moratorium on the death penalty was to be able to execute ‘terrorists’ swiftly and effectively, in order to send a strong message to possible perpetrators. CATEGORIES OF CONVICTED However, on 10th March 2015, PEOPLE the government completely lifted Terrorists , 30, 23% the ban on the death penalty, and also ordered the executions of convicts in cases related to Other homicide and kidnapping, even if Criminals , 103, there were no affiliations with 77% any terrorist organization. This measure was taken as the segregation between terrorists and people convicted for other crimes had proven highly problematic due to the complexity of related incidents and the application of laws. The measure itself is also highly problematic, as it dilutes the purpose of the lifting of the moratorium. According to a December 2014 report by the Justice Project Pakistan and Reprieve, “Data and projections from individual case studies suggest that as many as 86% of those sentenced under the ‘terrorism’ laws had nothing to do with terror at all.” Convicts who were involved in the killing or attempt to kill any government official, high profile person and/or have affiliations with any band organization have been included the list of ‘terrorists’, while the remaining have been included into the category of ‘Other Criminals’ in this list. According this criteria, since December 2014 to date, only 23 percent of convicted terrorists have been hung, while 77 percent of the executed are other criminals. 5 This data questions, therefore, the performance of the civil and anti-terrorist courts in terms
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