ISLAMABAD: Today, the Supreme Court will consider the suo motu notice regarding the killing of renowned journalist and presenter Arshad Sharif in Kenya (Monday).
The case will be heard at 1pm by a five-member Supreme Court bench presided over by CJP Umar Ata Bandial. The suo motu action was made by the chief justice to guarantee that the case would undergo an impartial and open investigation.
Justices Ijazul Ahsan, Sayyed Mazahar Ali Akbar Naqvi, Jamal Khan Mandokhail, and Muhammad Ali Mazhar are additional judges on the bench.
The Pakistani attorney general, foreign minister, president of the Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists (PFUJ), director-general of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA), information secretary Sheikh Mahmood Ahmad, AOR Adil Aziz Qazi, ASC Muhammad Saad Umar Butter, ASC Chaudhry Akhtar Ali, AOR Shazib Masud, advocate Supreme Court, and inspector general of police in Islamabad have all received notices from the court.
Media sources state that the special joint investigation team (JIT), established to look into the murder, will present its findings to the supreme court today. The team finished its investigation in Kenya and the United Arab Emirates and arrived back in Pakistan last week (UAE).
In a “mistaken identity” incident, Kenyan police shot and killed Sharif on October 23, 2016, as he was on his way from the country’s Magadi town to Nairobi.
The journalist was allegedly shot in a case of mistaken identity, according to Kenyan authorities, but later-discovered information refuted those accusations.
In accordance with the Supreme Court’s directives, the federal government established a new special joint investigative team (JIT) on December 8, 2022, to look into the journalist’s murder.
