The Supreme Court on Friday set April 19 to hear a petition filed by Pakistan’s former ambassador to the US Husain Haqqani seeking equal opportunity for recording his statement through a video link from London as it was done in the case of Mansoor Ijaz, the central character in the memogate.
A 10-member special bench headed by Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry will hear the petition. This petition was filed before the judicial commission probing the memo controversy by Haqqani’s counsel Zahid Hussain Bukhari.
It was also filed before the Supreme Court on March 24 by Haqqani through his counsel Asma Jahangir. The judicial commission had rejected the application and directed Haqqani to personally appear before it. The same application was pending before the Supreme Court as well for adjudication, for which the chief justice constituted a 10-member special bench on Friday to hear the petition on April 19.
Haqqani had also submitted his 82-page written statement before the three-member commission formed to probe the memo controversy stating that he contacted Mansoor Ijaz on May 9, 2011, not to draft and forward a memo but to ask him to tone down his criticism of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), Pakistan Army, and the Government of Pakistan. Haqqani said in his statement that he was very active in his endeavour of damage control after the May 2 Abbottabad operation and he has been in contact with several media persons, and has also been promoting Pakistan’s point of view through the western media.
Haqqani’s counsel told the commission that his client had not declined to appear before it in person but filed a request before the commission as well as the Supreme Court for providing equal treatment to him. Bukhari said his client had been facing threats in Pakistan which is why he had applied before the Supreme Court to ask the commission to record his statement in the UK through video link. He said he could not disclose the nature of threats to Haqqani at this juncture. However, he said that Haqqani had been facing “numerous threats”.
Bukhari has pleaded before the apex court to advance a similar kind of facility to his client that the commission awarded to Mansoor Ijaz in recording his statement from London through a video link.
In his application before the Supreme Court, Haqqani said that he had “grave security concerns” because of many “frivolous” and “sensational” allegations levelled by Mansoor Ijaz, and many intelligence agencies were in contact with Ijaz as he himself had admitted it during the proceedings of the commission, and that his family feared for his life in case he travelled to Pakistan.
Haqqani stated in his statement before the commission that he had no role in creating/drafting or delivering the alleged memorandum to the US Joint Chief of Staff Admiral Michael Mullen which was first reported in the Financial Times by Ijaz. Haqqani said that he was waiting to submit his detailed statement once Ijaz submits his entire evidence in support of his claims. He said there was no human witness to support Ijaz’s claim that he had drafted and delivered a disputed memo to Gen James Jones for onward transmission to Mullen under his (Haqqani’s) instructions because Ijaz’s assertions were false.
SC to hear Haqqani’s plea for video link on 19th
