ISLAMABAD, 15 March 2006 — The Rawalpindi bench of the Punjab High Court yesterday rejected an appeal filed by a convict, Mushtaq Ahmad, against his death sentence in connection with a plot to kill President Pervez Musharraf.
Mushtaq, a low-ranking serviceman, was among several civilians and junior soldiers arrested weeks after Al-Qaeda-linked militants allegedly tried to blow up Musharraf’s motorcade on Dec. 14, 2003, in Rawalpindi.
In 2004, he was sentenced to death by a military court after a trial at an undisclosed location.
Yesterday, Ahmad’s lawyer Mohammed Akram said the Lahore High Court had rejected his client’s appeal and upheld the death sentence against him.
He would give no further details.
Musharraf, who made Pakistan a key ally of the United States in its war on terror after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, has survived at least three known assassination attempts, all blamed on Al-Qaeda linked militants.
Although Musharraf escaped the Dec. 14, 2003 attack, at least 16 people were killed when suicide bombers tried to ram two explosives-laden vehicles into his limousine on Dec. 25, not far away from the scene of the first attack.
Since then, military courts have convicted several suspects, including soldiers, in the attack. One soldier was hanged last year at a prison in the eastern Punjab province.
Police Arrest Afghans
Police yesterday arrested 22 Afghan refugees in northwestern Pakistan, a day after ordering them to leave the country amid accusations they were sheltering militants linked to a recent spate of violence in the region, officials said.
