File photo. Aamir Qureshi—AFP
A day after several judges of the Islamabad High Court (IHC) received letters containing a suspicious powdered substance, authorities announced that judges of the Supreme Court and Lahore High Court (LHC) had received similar letters, triggering new inquiries of the Counter-Terrorism Department (CTD).
The letters to the apex court were addressed to Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Qazi Faez Isa and Justices Syed Mansoor Ali Shah, Athar Minallah, Jamal Khan Mandokhail, and Aminuddin. After being received at the Receipt and Issue Branch, they were forwarded to the judges’ staff, who alerted police after examining them. The threatening letters, which have no return address, have accused the judges of “rescuing evil.”
The CTD has registered a case against unknown persons under Section 7 of the Anti-Terrorism Act and Section 507 of the Pakistan Penal Code in response to a complaint lodged by Mohammad Iqbal, a duty in-charge at the Receipt and Issue Branch. According to the FIR, the letters were received on March 29/30, with some claiming to be sent by “Gulshan Khatoon,” while others were sent by “Sajjad Hussain.”
Reportedly, the letters carried Rs. 30 postage stamps and all contained a suspicious powder, which has been sent to the Forensic Science Laboratory Islamabad for toxicological tests.
LHC letters
Also on Wednesday, similar letters were received by five judges of the LHC, and have been sent for tests to the forensics laboratory, while a case has been registered by the CTD. The judges who received the letters were Chief Justice Malik Shahzad Ahmad Khan, and Justices Shujaat Ali Khan, Shahid Bilal Hassan, Aalia Neelum, and Abid Aziz Sheikh.
Reportedly, having already been alert after the letters received by judges of the IHC, staff at LHC did not open the envelopes and handed them over to police officials. Local media also reported an employee of a private courier company, who supposedly delivered the suspicious letters to the high court, was taken into custody.
Overnight, the Punjab CTD registered an FIR under the Anti-Terrorism Act and other charges against unknown suspects over the threatening letters.
Ongoing probe
DIG (Operations) Shehzad Bukhari appeared before the IHC CJ after the discovery of the latest letters and informed the court about the ongoing probe. Confirming that the suspicious powder was sent for forensic analysis, he said the Pakistan Post was part of the investigation.
During the hearing, he said the police department had written to the postmaster general to inquiry as to why the stamps were blurry, adding they appeared to be sent from Rawalpindi.