* Former president to be put in high security prison in Balochistan
* Officials say Musharraf will be treated as an under-trial prison
By Mohammad Zafar
QUETTA: Prisons officials are getting ready to detain former president General (r) Pervez Musharraf in Mach Jail as an under-trial prison facing murder charges.
The former president is wanted in the Nawab Mohammad Akbar Bugti murder case along with his accomplices, including his former handpicked prime minister Shaukat Aziz and Balochistan chief minister Jam Mir Mohammad Yousaf.
Nawab Bugti was ambushed and killed on his way from the Bugti Hills to Marri Hills on August 26, 2006. The prisons authorities are also assessing an option to keep Musharraf in the District Jail, Quetta, but due to high security facilities available at Mach, it is expected that the former president will be detained at the central prison.
Nawabzada Jamil Akbar Bugti, son of late Nawab Bugti, had filed a petition in the Balochistan High Court, asking it to direct the officials concerned to register a murder case against General (r) Pervez Musharraf and his accomplices for killing Nawab Bugti and his 32 other companions in Bugti Hills.
Ultimately, the high court ordered registration of a murder case and asked the government to issue international arrest warrants for Musharraf through the Interior Ministry. Arrest warrants have been issued by the Balochistan government, but they are yet to be served on the accused who are abroad. Almost all accomplices of Musharraf denied the allegations that they were, in any way, involved in the assassination of Nawab Akbar Bugti. They all blame Musharraf, claiming that Bugti was killed in a military operation and the civilians, including the prime minister, had no knowledge.
They responded to their implication in the case by saying that Musharraf was calling all the shots. Sindh Home Minister Manzoor Wassan told a news conference the other day that Musharraf would be arrested on his arrival at Karachi airport.
It is expected that after his cases in Sindh, the former president will be handed over to Balochistan to face the murder charges. The former President announced that he would return to Pakistan at the end of this month. The Sindh Home Department has reportedly received the arrest warrants of Pervez Musharraf, issued by the relevant courts of Rawalpindi in the Benazir Bhutto assassination case.
The Sindh home minister announced at a press conference that police have been ordered to handcuff the former president, as he was now a proclaimed offender. The home minister also said that nobody was above the law. He had said that if a civilian government arrested Musharraf, this would be the first time in the history of Pakistan in which a retired army chief and former president was arrested and kept in jail.
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2012%5C01%5C16%5Cstory_16-1-2012_pg7_19
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