An anti-terrorism court has summoned former president Pervez Musharraf on May 23 in a case pertaining to detention of judges of the Supreme Court during 2007 emergency imposed by him.
ATC judge Atiqur Rehman resumed hearing of the case wherein Musharraf’s counsel presented an application seeking exemption for his client from appearing in court on Friday.
It was submitted in the application that the former military dictator is in Karachi and is unable to travel to Islamabad due to severe backache.
The prosecution lawyer, Amir Nadeem Tabish, raised an objection but the court accepted the application and ordered that Musharraf be produced at the next hearing on May 23.
Musharraf is currently in Karachi. He arrived in the city from Islamabad last month to undergo some diagnostic tests in the Pakistan Navy hospital, Pakistan Navy Ship Shifa.
The former dictator cannot fly away from the country as the federal government has refused to remove his name from the Exit Control List (ECL).
The 70-year-old former dictator was indicted in March on charges related to imposition of emergency rule in 2007. The retired general, who seized power in 1999 and resigned in 2008, has pleaded “not guilty” to treason charges.
He faces the death penalty if convicted of the charges, under Article 6 of the Constitution of Pakistan.
Musharraf is on bail in other major cases, including assassination of Pakistan People’s Party leader Benazir Bhutto in 2007 and the murder of Baloch nationalist leader Nawab Akbar Bugti in 2006.