SUPREME COURT DIRECTS GOVERNMENT TO FORM COMMISSION TO PROBE SALEEM’S KILLING

ISLAMABAD: On Monday the Supreme Court of Pakistan directed to the government to form a judicial commission to probe the killing of journalist Syed Saleem Shahzad.

Earlier, the court had ordered to submission of the entire record of the investigations into Mr.Shahzad’s killing and asked to the government functionaries concerned to explain their position on a petition moved by the Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists (PFUJ) seeking appointment of a high-powered judicial commission to investigate the case.

On June 17, a bench comprising of Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry, Justice Tariq Parvez and Justice Amir Hani Muslim took up the petition filed by the Supreme Court Bar Association’s chief Asma Jehangir on behalf of the PFUJ and asked the secretaries of interior, information and law to submit comments and answer the questions raised in the petition.

A commission set up earlier by the government to investigate Mr.Shahzad’s killing was mired in controversy, similar to the one which had erupted after the formation of committee on the covert US attack on Abbottabad.