Army chief confirms death sentences of 9 terrorists

RAWALPINDI: Chief of the Army Staff (COAS) General Raheel Sharif on Monday signed death warrants of nine ‘hardcore terrorists’, tried by the military courts.

DG Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) Major General Asim Bajwa said on Twitter that the terrorists were involved in killing of civilians as well as of personnel of law enforcement agencies in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

#COAS confirms death sentence of 9 hard core terrorists involved in killing civs/LEA persons in KPK,sectarian killings at Mastung,suicidal.1

— AsimBajwaISPR (@AsimBajwaISPR) September 21, 2015

He further said they were involved in sectarian killings in Balochistan’s Mastung, suicide attack on a mosque in Nowshera, attack on Maj Gen Sanaullah and Col Tauseef. One terrorist was also awarded life imprisonment, the DG ISPR added.

..attk on mosque in Noshera,attk on Maj Gen Sanaullah&Col Tauseef. 1 terrorist awarded life imprisonment.cases' detail follows separately-2

— AsimBajwaISPR (@AsimBajwaISPR) September 21, 2015

The men were convicted by the military courts established as part of a crackdown on militancy following the Army Public School attack in Peshawar on December 16 last year, in which more than 150 people, mostly children, were killed.

Parliament approved the use of the courts for the next two years, and the Supreme Court endorsed the move last month, rejecting claims it was unconstitutional.

The army announced the first verdicts and sentences from the new courts in April when six militants were condemned to death and another jailed for life, all on terrorism charges.

On August 13, it announced death sentences for seven more militants for their involvement in the Peshawar school massacre and an attack on a bus carrying members of the minority Ismaili community.