QUETTA, 12 MAY, (DNA) – Convicted murderer Saulat Mirza was hanged to death in the early hours of Tuesday at Balochistan’s Machh Jail.
Mirza’s body was shifted from Machh Jail to the Edhi morgue in Quetta. Eighteen family members accompanied his body from Machh to Quetta. His body will be flown to Karachi in the evening today (Tuesday).
Mirza had been on death row for nearly 17 years. Sentenced to death in 1999, Mirza was initially scheduled to be executed on March 19 this year after Pakistan lifted its moratorium on capital punishment in the wake of the Peshawar school massacre.
But in a dramatic turn of events, video footage of Mirza hurling grave allegations at Altaf Hussain and other MQM leaders of complicity in crime was aired on television channels just few hours before his execution on March 19. The president immediately stayed his hanging for three days after the convict sought more time to give information regarding target killers and their alleged patrons.
A few days later, Mirza’s hanging was put off again as authorities wished to interrogate him for crucial details in relation to his confession.
A 10-member joint-investigation team later questioned Mirza over his confession and eventually concluded that his disclosures did not constitute any ‘actionable intelligence or cogent evidence’ that could help the judicial process.
On May 2, the trial court issued Mirza’s black warrant for a third time, scheduling his hanging for May 12. =DNA
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