AFP/Lahore
Rights activists in Pakistan and from the European Union condemned the execution of a convicted murderer who campaigners say was a juvenile when the crime was committed.
Ansar Iqbal was accused of the killing after a quarrel when he was a student in 1994. He was executed on Tuesday.
But Namra Gilani, a lawyer for the Justice Project Pakistan (JPP), said yesterday that Iqbal’s family had approached the advocacy group recently.
They said Iqbal, their only son, had been born in 1978, and so was under 18 at the time of the crime.
The EU delegation to Pakistan issued a statement saying the court had reportedly refused to consider new evidence that proved his age, including an
official birth certificate.
“This adds to a growing number of cases where executions have been carried out in Pakistan for crimes allegedly carried out by juveniles,” the statement said.
The most high-profile case was that of Shafqat Hussain, hanged in August for killing a seven-year-old boy in Karachi in 2004 despite an international outcry after claims he was a juvenile at the time and was tortured into confessing.
Iqbal’s co-accused Ghulam Shabbir was eventually declared a juvenile and his death sentence commuted
to 14 years imprisonment.
Pakistan has hanged dozens of convicts since ending a six-year moratorium on executions last December, after Taliban militants massacred more than 150 people—mostly children—at a school.
Supporters argue that the death penalty is the only effective way to deal with the scourge of militancy in the country.
But critics say the legal system is unjust, with rampant police torture, poor representation for victims and unfair trials.
Punjabi prison officials said the matter was a problem for the courts rather than the prisons.
