Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) President Asma Jahangir said on Sunday the SCBA would challenge the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) and Provincially Administered Tribal Areas (PATA) Regulations in court if the government did not withdraw them within a few days.
According to the regulations, the armed forces have the power to detain anyone on mere suspicion of being involved in terrorism and any action of the armed forces in this regard could not be challenged in any court of the country. Asma said both regulations were a violation of the freedom of expression and fundamental human rights.
“The FATA and PATA Regulations are draconian laws and if the government does not withdraw them, the SCBA will challenge them in the court,” she said. Asma said further the SCBA was only waiting for the government to withdraw the regulations. She said the SCBAP and Pakisatan Business Council (PBC) had strongly urged the government to immediately withdraw the regulations and had suggested measures which were in conformity with the constitution, adding that the spirit of FATA and PATA Regulations undermined basic human rights and principles of international human law.
“The regulations exclude application of the Qanune-Shahadat Order while dealing with a large category of criminal offences. It gives armed forces the power of detention and interrogation for an unspecified period of time. The oversight board constituted to review such detentions include two armed forces personnel and death sentence as a punishment has been introduced for the first time in FATA.
Application of these Regulations has been made with retrospective effect from February 01, 2008. Worst of all the evidence of armed forces personnel has been made conclusive,” a joint press of SCBA and PCB said.
