Pakistan lodging fake FIRs against terrorists to mislead FATF

Pakistan is again misleading the Global community just days before a crucial meeting of the Financial Action Task Force ( FATF ) in Bangkok by registering fake and weak Police First Information Reports or FIRs against Terror groups and terrorists operating on its soil.

Providing hard evidence about Pakistan's attempts to mislead the Global Community well informed sources revealed that on July 1, an FIR was registered at Gujranwala police station based on the information provided by a 'source' against a land deal by members of banned Daawat-wal-Irshad, a subsidiary organisation of Lashkar-e-Tayyeba (LeT), which is headed by Hafiz Muhammad Saeed.

The FIR has been drafted in lay terms which may not stand the scrutiny of law at subsequent stages, say legal sources.

An FIR copy accessed by ANI states: "It is submitted that at 1:30 pm, the undersigned along with Mumtaz Ahmed ASI, Irfan Ahmed 1199/C and Rizwan Azam 1184/C was present near Usman Chowk Malikwal and the source informed that Muhammed Ali s/o Salim Akhtar caste Rajput r/o Malikwal city provides a piece of land (18 Maria and 6 Sarsai) with its Khaiwat number 449, Khatoni No. 839 to 840, located near Usman Chowk (Rana Town) Mohalla Faisalabad, district Malikwal to banned Daawat-wal-Irshad, a subsidiary organisation of Lashkar-e-Tayyeba, knowing that banned LeT and DwI are involved in terrorist activities and the mentioned property will be used for propagation of terrorist activities and by using this property, these banned organisations can collect funds for the terrorist activities and financial help of the terrorists".

There is no mention in the FIR against LeT chief Hafiz Muhammed Saeed and four others including Abdul Ghaffar, Hafiz Masood, Amir Hamza and Malik Zafar Iqbal about the time since the land was in possession of these terrorists.

"The aforesaid persons, who are members of banned LeT and trustees of banned trust Daawat-wal-Irshad, used the mentioned property for terrorist activities. They also used it for terrorist financing by collecting funds and also used the property for the propagation of terrorist activities", says the FIR

The FIR does not mention anything about Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD) or Falah-e-Insaniat Foundation (FIF). The FIR mentions the name of Daawat-wal-Irshad, an old name of JuD.

Legal experts say that each individuals role has also not been listed and timeline of the offence has also not been mentioned in the FIR.

The FIR further stated that "Muhammed Ali s/o Salim Akhtar, caste Rajput committed the offence under ATA/1997, II-H3 (a)(b) by providing the mentioned property of LeT and Daawat-wal-Irshad and the persons namely Abdul Ghaffar, Hafiz Masood, Amir Hamza, Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, Malik Zafar Iqbal acquired the property for terrorist activities, collection of funds, terrorism financing and committed the offence under ATA/1977, 11F(2),(5),(6)/11H2/11-1/11-N".

A legal expert said that the FIR has used generalised worlds for acts of terrorism instead of specific acts connected with the law. "How and in what manner the acts were committed is missing", said a source adding that the whole exercise is designed to pull the wool over the eyes of the FATF. The final meeting of FATF is expected to be held in the first week of October to take a crucial decision either to exclude Pakistan from the grey list or keep it into the grey list or put the country into the blacklist.

Out of the 27 point action plan, there are seven points related to proscribed outfits involved in terror financing.

To save itself from any sanctions by FATF, an inter-governmental body, Pakistan is making weak and fake cases against the proscribed terror outfits knowing fully well that they do not have legal standing other than to just make a point with the FATF - which is blatantly being mislead as evidenced by the nature of the FIR's being filed against the terror groups and their supporters.