THE deadly terrorist attack by Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) on the Army Public School in Peshawar on December 16, 2014 inflicted deep wounds on the hearts and minds of every Pakistani. The pain of the APS massacre is indelible, with 124 children among the 144 victims. Therefore, the nation observes the anniversary of the APS attack on December 16 to pay homage to the martyrs and reaffirm the national resolve to defeat terrorist outfits and violent extremist ideologies.
During the attack, nine militants intruded onto the school premises and indiscriminately started killing children, students and teachers. While security forces engaged them, seven suicide bombers detonated themselves after facing resistance. The TTP aimed to shatter the resolve of Pakistanis by targeting students, but the civil and military leadership conceived a National Action Plan (NAP) and security forces eliminated the perpetrators of the APS tragedy, incapacitating terrorist outfits from conducting further violence.
Under the NAP, the establishment of military courts was a landmark event in Pakistan’s war against terrorism. The 21st Amendment to the Constitution established military courts for two years as a last resort due to the paralysis of the judicial system caused by the onslaught of terrorists in the country. The defence forces, law enforcement and intelligence agencies were conducting operations with the utmost care to avoid collateral damages. They tried to apprehend terrorists rather than kill them in order to spare innocents and meet legal requirements to maintain law and order. Unfortunately, ordinary courts and prosecution were not sufficient to deal with militants, who were bent on destroying everything. The terrorist attacks, especially suicide bombings, spare no traces like firearms, eyewitnesses, and other circumstantial evidence admissible in court under ordinary laws. These ground facts prove that the civil judicial system and laws cannot cope with terrorists, despite the government’s major efforts to make up for their deficiencies in this regard. Only the Pakistan Army has advanced technical expertise in forensics to run the trials of modern terrorists. This situation made the military courts inevitable for counterterrorism in Pakistan.
The military courts were the cornerstone of Pakistan’s legal victory over terrorists and they played a pivotal role in eliminating the militants who were involved in the APS attack. Security forces arrested 12 terrorists and killed others during the operations, while 27 militants of the TTP perpetrated a horrific attack. The TTP chief, Mullah Fazlullah, was the mastermind of the attack, and Umar Mansoor Naray was the master planner, who also released a confessional video after the attack. In 2017, a drone strike in Afghanistan killed Naray, and the following year, another drone strike in Afghanistan eliminated Fazlullah. The military courts put the apprehended militants on trial and handed death sentences to six main terrorists.
The then COAS General Raheel Sharif lifted the moratorium on the execution of the death sentence in the NAP and signed the black warrants for four terrorists. On December 2, 2015, authorities executed them in a civilian jail in Kohat. The court sentenced militant Molvi Abdus Salam to death for his involvement in harbouring suicide bombers for the APS attack as an active member of the TTP. The death sentence was also awarded to TTP militant Hazrat Ali, who played a role in funding the attack as an active member of the TTP. Additionally, the court sentenced militant Mujeeb-ur-Rehman, also known as Ali or Najeebullah, to death for abetting the attack as an active TTP member. Another death sentence was given to militant Sabeel, also known as Yahya, who was an active TTP member involved in abetting the attack. TTP militant Taj Muhammad, alias Rizwanullah, was hanged on 24 May 2017, while the Supreme Court still had the matter of militant Atiqur Rehman pending. As mentioned earlier, the government established military courts as a last resort because all efforts to reform and update existing civil judicial and prosecution systems yielded no results. Recognizing legal deficiencies, the government enacted special laws to address terrorism-related cases, ensuring that those involved in terrorism do not escape the law. Furthermore, amendments to the Pakistan Army Act of 1952 were made, facilitating trials in military courts.
Modern terrorism has been an unprecedented phenomenon and many countries have taken extra-ordinary steps to cope with illegal combatants. The USA and European countries, despite their strong belief in democratic values, the rule of law and human rights, have made exceptional legal arrangements to deal with terrorists. Regular courts in Pakistan rarely punish militants, leaving hundreds of traumatized families awaiting justice. Many debates criticize the deficiencies of the existing criminal code and anti-terror laws of Pakistan, highlighting the rare conviction of terrorists due to a lack of evidence against offenders. Unsophisticated investigation techniques and outdated methods of collection of evidence and prosecution are the main reasons for the failure to deal with technically advanced and sophisticated terrorists trained and aided by hostile agencies. Therefore, there should be no doubt that extraordinary measures like military trials are inevitable for tackling the terrorist threat in the country.
Pakistan is passing through special circumstances and dealing with unconventional threats in transforming war strategies requires special measures to handle the terrorist threats, including laws that upgrade our existing structures. The judiciary also needs support to handle issues related to terrorist outfits, and military trials of civilians are not impingement on the authority of any institution; rather, it is a supportive mechanism, as the Armed Forces have rendered assistance to law enforcement agencies in the war against terrorism. Therefore, the nation must strengthen our security forces by exhibiting strong resolve against terrorists on a national level, and the National Action Plan was certainly a milestone in this direction. In this regard, the trial of civilians in military courts under the Official Secrets Act 1923 and the Pakistan Army Act 1952 should not be hampered by any means, and the legal fraternity must realize that it would strengthen the hands of terrorists in deteriorating the law and order in the country.
—The writer is a contributing columnist on issues of violent extremism and militancy.
views expressed are writer’s own.
