According to a statement released by the Supreme Court (SC) on Tuesday, Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Umar Ata Bandial has taken suo motu notice of the “brutal assassination” of journalist Arshad Sharif.
The change occurs three days after Imran Khan, the leader of the PTI, wrote a letter to CJP Bandial requesting that he conduct an impartial judicial investigation into the death of Sharif, who was shot dead in Kenya on October 24.
According to the SC statement, the matter will be heard by the supreme court at 12:30 p.m. today. Notices have also been sent to the interior secretary, foreign affairs secretary, information and broadcasting secretary, director general (DG) of the Federal Investigation Agency, director general (DG) of the Intelligence Bureau, and president of the Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists.
A five-member bench, headed by the CJP, would hear the case, the statement said.
The country’s journalist community as well as the general public are distressed and worried over the death of the senior journalist, and they are asking the court to look into the situation, it continued.
Imran and other PTI officials have been calling for a probe into the “targeted death” of the well-known journalist, claiming that he was forced to leave Pakistan and subsequently the United Arab Emirates as well, where he had briefly resided before traveling to Kenya. However, the Foreign Office has denied these allegations.
Furthermore, the CJP received a letter from Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif last month requesting that a judicial panel be established to investigate the situation.
On November 2, Sharif’s mother sent a letter to the CJP asking for the creation of a powerful judicial panel to look into the assassination.
