The government is all set to free and then re-arrest immediately three detained lawyers on the expiry of their 90-day detention period on February 1 in a move to outmanoeuvre the constitutional bar on preventive detention.

According to The News, one of the top legal minds of the government confided to the paper that the government has decided to free Chaudhry Aitzaz Ahsan, Ali Ahmad Kurd and Justice (retd) Tariq Mehmud for few hours or a day and then re-arrest them by issuing a fresh executive order.

About detained judges, including deposed Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, government sources said there is nothing to bother about them because their detention was without any formal order. “Deposed judges were not under detention,” the source said, asking, “If you have any formal order to prove us wrong?”

Under the Constitution, no person can be kept in preventive detention for more than 90 days unless a judicial review board certifies that the person is a threat to public safety, but the government has not referred cases of any of three leading lawyers for judicial review.

Under the Constitution their cases are required to be approved by such judicial bodies in case the government intends to retain their preventive detention beyond the mandatory period. A top government legal mind, on condition of anonymity, said the government does not intend to set the three lawyers free and their cases would not be referred to the judicial review boards.

The source said the constitutional bar would easily be defeated by freeing detainees for sometime and then getting them rearrested under fresh executive orders. Two of the three lawyers -- Aitzaz Ahsan and Ali Muhammad Kurd -- though arrested on November 3 were not detained on one order, but under three successive orders for 30 days each instead. However, Justice (retd) Tariq was detained for 90 days under one executive order.

Independent sources point out that if the government can avoid the 90-day limit by passing three or more one-month orders in succession then the limit can always be flouted and the provision of the Constitution would be meaningless.

“The Constitution cannot be subverted in this manner,” senior lawyers Athar Minallah said. Clause 4 in Article 10 of the Constitution says no law providing for preventive detention shall be made except to deal with persons acting in a manner prejudicial to the integrity, security or defence of Pakistan or any part thereof, external affairs of Pakistan, public order, maintenance of supplies or services, and no such law shall authorise the detention of a person for a period exceeding three months unless the appropriate review board has, after affording him an opportunity of being heard in person, reviewed his case and reported, before the expiration of the said period, that there is, in its opinion, sufficient cause for such detention, and, if the detention is continued after the said period of three months, unless the appropriate review board has reviewed his case and reported, before the expiration of each period of three months, that there is, in its opinion, sufficient cause for such detention.

Islamabad, January 31
An influential group of former Pakistani military officers today asked President Pervez Musharraf to hand over power to sacked Chief Justice Iftikahr M Chaudhry and appoint another deposed judge Rana Bhagwandas as the chief election commissioner to ensure free and fair polls.

The group of former generals, admirals, air marshals and other officers, who met at a hotel here, also decided to join the legal fraternity in a protest against Musharraf on February 5.

After lengthy deliberations on the situation in the country, the meeting chaired by Air Marshal (retd) Asghar Khan called on Musharraf to quit and hand over power to

Chaudhry, who has been under house arrest since he was deposed by the President during the emergency rule. The former military officers said Musharraf should appoint Bhagwandas, the lone Hindu to reach the highest echelons of the Pakistani judiciary, as the chief election commissioner to ensure the holding of free and fair polls on February 18.

The meeting did not set any cut-off date for Musharraf to step down. The retired officers did not respond to the questions from reporters on whether they would contact army chief Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani or other serving officers to discuss their demands.

The officers also avoided responding to the questions on whether they would apologise to the country for their role in politics under several military rulers, saying the meeting had not deliberated on such issues.

This was the second meeting of former military officers that had asked Musharraf to step down as the President to pave the way for restoring democracy.

Musharraf had reacted angrily to a similar demand last week from the Pakistan Ex-Servicemen Society, saying it had been made by “insignificant personalities” whom he had “kicked” out of the office.

Musharraf, who stepped down as army chief in November 2007, and several of his close military aides were invited to the meeting but none of them attended it.

The meeting said Pakistan’s judiciary had been harmed a lot under Musharraf’s rule and demanded the reinstatement of judges, who were deposed during the emergency.

The meet was attended by former army chief Mirza Aslam Beg, Lt Gen Abdul Majid Malik, who was the staff officer of Field Marshal Ayub Khan, former Inter-Services Intelligence chief Lt Gen Hamid Gul, Lt Gen Jamshed Gulzar Kayani and Lt Gen Asad Durrani. — PTI

Vancouver, January 31
Inderjit Singh Reyat, the only person jailed in the Air India bombing of 1985, will walk out of prison a free man on February 9.

Reyat, who is completing his five-year jail term that day for pleading guilty to manslaughter in the Air India bombing, was to go on trial for perjury.

But the British Columbia Supreme Court delayed the trial here on Wednesday.

The perjury trial had arisen out of Reyat’s alleged lying during the trial of Air India bombing suspects -- Ripudaman Singh Malik and Ajaib Singh Bagri -- in 2003.

During his five-day testimony, Reyat is said to have lied 27 times, and the trial ended in acquittal of Malik and Bagri.

Earlier, there was speculation that Reyat had struck a deal with the prosecution to plead guilty to perjury charges in return for a lenient jail term. The maximum jail term for perjury is 14 years.

Justice Patrick Dohm, the associate chief of the British Columbia Supreme Court, said a fresh date for perjury trial would be set on March 7.

Lawyers for either the prosecution or Reyat didn’t give any reasons for delay.

Reyat helped Air India plot mastermind Talwinder Singh Parmar to test a bomb that blew off the Kanishka flight 182 in June 23, 1985, killing all 329 persons on board and another bomb that killed two baggage handlers at Tokyo airport the same day.

Reyat was nabbed after a tuner used in the Tokyo bomb was traced to a shop in his hometown of Duncan in British Columbia. He pleaded guilty to his role in making that bomb and was given 10 years in jail in 1991.

After this, he was jailed for another five years for pleading guilty to his role in making the bomb that killed 329 aboard Kanishka. — IANS

London, January 31
A new research by British scientists raises the prospect of babies being born through entirely artificial means, and possibly sidelining men from the process of creating life.

Even as researchers at Newcastle upon Tyne University say their technique will create new treatments for infertility, critics fear that by turning female bone marrow into sperm, it could remove men from the process of creating life.

According to New Scientist magazine, the researchers envisage taking stem cells from a woman donor’s bone marrow and transform them into sperm through the use of special chemicals and vitamins, the Daily Mail of Britain reported today.

Professor Karim Nayernia of Newcastle has sought permission from the authorities for starting the experiment within the next two months.

The biologist believes early-stage “female sperm” could be produced within two years while mature sperm capable of fertilising eggs might take three more years.

The research promises to provide an invaluable insight into the problem and cure of infertility.

On a different level, it also sets the stage for lesbian couples and gay men to have children that are biologically their own, further complicating the ethical and moral debate over the issue in societies worldwide. — PTI