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Encounter: Bypassing The Third Pillar

Who would have thought that pictures of a model-like guy will be used to show an innocent who was murdered in one of Karachi’s encounter killings. While common sense treats him far from being involved in terrorist activities, the statements of friends and family members, and the overall image portrayed through social media depicts him as a broadminded gentleman.
The term encounter is used when policemen or other law enforcement officials retaliate in self-defence whenever they are attacked by suspected gangsters or terrorists. Pakistan’s constitution itself requires police to produce suspects before law, and accountability of those who carry out unlawful killings.
Muhammad Ali Nekokara, a former police officer, writes that encounter deaths are often justified by moral righteousness and passive obedience to authority. Nekokara noted that rogue elements within the police department benefit from these killings in terms of power and authority. This gives rise to the so-called ‘encounter specialists’ like Malir SSP Rao Anwar who maintain their monopoly within an area for unusually long periods.
Anwar has remained a controversial policeman. He had participated in the 1992 Karachi operation, and was transferred back to Karachi only when PPP came to power in 2007.  His rivals claim that he is feared in the outskirts of the metropolitan for taking hefty bribes, having stayed as the senior superintendent of the area for the last nine years – in violation of Police Order of 2002.
High ranking police officials opine that the phenomenon of extra-legal killings mushroom when criminal-minded policemen make their own ‘gangs’ to extort money from criminals by threatening to kill them by shootout, or when they are involved in settling personal vendetta.  For this reason, some Pakistani police officials are made to believe that encounter is “to make sure that no criminal escapes justice because of lack of evidence and witnesses”.
Staged encounters also occur because of gaps within the criminal justice system where complication in prosecution of criminals is caused due to lack of functional relationship between police, laws, prosecutors, lawyers and judges.
Encounter killings are not new in Pakistan – especially after threat of terrorism. They not only oppose the human rights but also compromise the whole system of justice – bypassing the third pillar of state.
In 2016, the Human Rights Watch had charged Pakistani police of fake encounters, torture and extrajudicial killings with over 2,000 people reportedly killed.  A report compiled by the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) calls impunity as one of the main factors causing extra-legal killings, asking the government to probe every encounter killing.
Targeted operations, whether in South Punjab or Karachi, may or may not result in lessening the serious crimes, though they result in killing several suspects in police encounters. These killings are likely to go unchecked since there is little investigation and no prosecution despite complaints received by the HRCP.
An active policy of awareness and reforms within the criminal justice system are long awaited. Incidents like that of Naqeeb Mehsud have brought to light the lack of eagerness of the police department to investigate the suspected extra-judicial killings.

By: Umair Sohail

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