ISLAMABAD: An Islamabad court has ordered removing a controversial paragraph mentioning “terrorist states” from the verdict that convicted lawyer Imaan Mazari and her husband Hadi Ali Chatha in controversial tweets case last week.
In an order, Additional District and Sessions Judge Muhammad Afzal Majoka said the controversial para was added “due to a clerical mistake which is not supported by any statutory provision, judicial precedent, executive notification, international instrument or authoritative reference, so the same may be deleted because this sentence is vague and ambiguous”.
The judgement further noted that the stenographer in written reply mentioned that this sentence, along with other sentences were deleted during correction of the judgement, but at the time of final print, it was wrongly included and “that this mistake on his part is bona fide,” Geo News reported.
The now-deleted paragraph, which appeared as paragraph 36 on page 18, mentioned that the four countries are currently designated as terrorist states.
Earlier on Thursday night, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs received a ‘note’ from the Embassy of Iran regarding the judgment by Judge Majoka. The formal diplomatic note from the Government of Iran is now with the Afghanistan, Iran, Turkiye Division at the Foreign Office.
Earlier on Thursday, the Ambassador of Iran, Ambassador Reza Amiri Moghadam held a press conference at the embassy in which he spoke mainly on the imminent threat by the Trump administration against Iran.
Soon after the press conference news started to circulate on social media that Iran had sent a note to the Foreign Office complaining about the judgment. There was no confirmation of the note by the Foreign Office on Thursday as it reached the ministry late in the night.
The contents of the note were also revealed in which the Iranian Embassy had protested these remarks, and also pointed to a statement by the Spokesperson of the Foreign Office who had in response to a query said, “We have seen the judgement. These are views of the learned judge. Pakistan, of course, does not subscribe to this opinion. This kind of designation of terrorist states does not exist either in the UN parlance or under international law.”
