Ex-Pak serviceman seeks re-evaluation of secret agencies' role in targeted killings

An ex-serviceman in Pakistan is seeking an order for reassessing the role of secret agencies.

Naik Mohammad Iqbal, who had been picked up and brutally tortured, moved to the Supreme Court seeking an order for the constitution of a parliamentary committee for reassessing the role, which include the Military Intelligence and the Inter-Services Intelligence.

Iqbal, who filed the order in the court through Advocate Inamul Raheem, said the re-evaluation by the parliamentary committee will help avoid crippling of young soldiers and end the recovery of mutilated dead bodies

According to Dawn News, Iqbal was taken into custody by intelligence agencies on Nov 27, 2004, when his battalion was deployed on the Leepa Front in Azad Kashmir but, he was never informed about the charges, his counsel said.

In the application, Iqbal claimed his detention was kept so secret that even his family was not informed about his sudden disappearance.

The family members were made to believe that he had disappeared without the knowledge and notice of his unit.

Iqbal has also requested for a high-level inquiry to determine legality and the mandate of the treatment meted out to him by secret agencies during his captivity, the report said.

According to the report, Iqbal also requested the court to hold responsible the entire chain of command, including the corps commanders, directors general of ISI and the MI and former president Pervez Musharraf, for illegally allowing the intelligence agencies to use draconian methods to suppress others for personal gains.