May 22, 2024
By Bilal Baseer
ISLAMABAD
In a court proceeding on Tuesday, Attorney General Mansoor Awan promised to take responsibility for the recovery of Kashmiri poet Ahmad Farhad.
On May 16, Farhad, a resistance poet, was abducted from his residence in Islamabad by unknown persons.
Voicepk spoke to prominent activists who were on the court premises, regarding the case: unknown persons.
The court directed the Attorney General to recover Farhad by the next hearing and adjourned the case till Friday May 24.
“He assured us that the poet would be brought back soon, but we pushed him a little saying he had already been missing since 5 days now,” said Hadi Ali Chatta, who is Ahmad Farhad’s lawyer. “We also mentioned torture, because we do not know what condition he was kept in. Those who return tell terrible stories of what has happened to them. But he (Mansoor Awan) promised that no such thing would happen to him and that Farhad would return even before the next hearing, the date of which is Friday, May 24.”
However human rights lawyer Imaan Mazari, who is also a counsel for the poet, took the promise more skeptically.
“The federal government has given similar assurances before as well,” said Mazari. “On January 10, 2024, they assured us regarding the Baloch students’ case, there was another case in the Supreme Court where they gave us assurance, but still people were being picked up. The State should end its policy of enforced disappearances, and the federal government should give a clear stance, issue an apology, not just give assurances. If they want truth and reconciliation they should start by giving us the truth first.”
“A few months ago, in a missing persons’ case in the SC, the Chief Justice Qazi Faez Isa had asked if people were still being forcibly disappeared, and when I told him they were, he summoned the Attorney General,” related Colonel (Retired) Inaam, a lawyer who is known for fighting for missing persons. “The AG was directed to make a statement that no person would go missing again, which he did standing in the Supreme Court. But sadly this has happened and in the capital city.”
“There is pressure being increased slowly,” said rights activist Amina Masood Janjua. “The Sector Commander from ISI had also been summoned today, and other institutions and departments are also being questioned, and it was said whether the Constitution would rule the country, or the (self-made) laws of the intelligence agencies.”
The hearing was postponed till Friday, May 24.