KARACHI, June 08 2006: The Sindh High Court asked the federal interior and defence secretaries on May 07 to file affidavits that a Pakistani promoter of a Dubai-based television channel was not in the custody of any of the agencies working under their ministries.

According to his wife, Munir Ahmed Mengal of ‘Baloch Voice’ was whisked away by personnel of an unnamed federal agency from the Karachi airport on his arrival from Dubai on April 4. He was detained for a while by FIA immigration officials at the airport for verification of his documents and picked up by some other agency personnel as he came out of the airport. The FIA denied arrest or custody.

The petition came up before a vacation division bench comprising Justice M. Mujibullah Siddiqui and Syed Zawwar Hussain Jaffery. The petitioner’s counsel, Abdul Hafeez Lakho, said the two ministries were asked twice to submit their comments but had failed to comply with the court order. He said there was no grievance against the provincial government.

The bench asked the federal secretaries to file affidavits or detailed comments by June 21, when the petition would again come up for hearing.
Source: Dawn
Date:6/8/2006