Islamabad Zubair kasuri: Shahzad Akbar
serves legal notice on Pakistan to charge it with life attempt l. A legal notice has been sent to the Pakistani embassy in the UK by Shahzad Akbar Khan, former adviser to former Prime Minister Imran Khan and Federal Minister alleging life attempt on him by the Pakistani agencies.
The Pakistan High Commission in the UK has received and sent the legal notice to the Government of Pakistan vide his letter No. 2192 dated 2/5/24 while the same has been referred to the Attorney General for Pakistan, the Secretary of the Ministry of Law and Justice
Secretary Interior Ministry Islamabad and Director General ISI Pakistan.
Consisting of more than 60 points, Shehzad Akbar through his attorney Leighday has enlisted the government of Pakistan as a party. The legal notice has asked the Commission to respond by June 10, 2024.
The legal notice on behalf of Shahzad Akbar has strongly criticized the Pakistani army, establishment, and law enforcement agencies alleging that Pakistan or its agents are causing trouble to him and his family. Mr Shahzad cited a November 26, 2023 incident when acid was thrown at him and he was harassed and a life attempt was made at him at his Bread Food home in Britain.
Shehzad Akbar, who joined the former Prime Minister Imran Khan’s government on August 10, 2018, and in September 2018, was appointed as Imran Khan’s advisor on accountability, said he started as the first chairman of the the Asset Recovery Unit (ARU) whose scope was expanded in December 2019 to including therein accountability and interior affairs. He was given the status of a federal minister in the cabinet.
In the legal notice Shahzad Akbar alleged that then Army Chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa and Pakistan’s ISI chief were using intelligence against the then opponents which included both the main political parties, Pakistan People’s Party and Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz “to coerce them to work for the military establishment. The claimant also became conscious of the role, the military establishment played in influencing how accountability was and was not upheld in Pakistan.”
The claimant said he was approached in 2021 by a senior officer of the ISI and told that he was not helpful to Pakistan as an adviser to Imran Khan, you should look after the interests of the ISI and not provide any information to Khan that “would challenge the authority of the military establishment”.
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The claimant said in his legal notice that retired Qamar Javed Bajwa strongly criticized his work and suggested that he was responsible for creating a rift between Khan and the military elite.
He said the military establishment was at odds with him because he “highlighted the role the army and the ISI played in interfering with his accountability anti-corruption objectives.”
The claimant said he realised that he could not end the rampant corruption singlehandedly and, told Imran Khan that he wanted to resign, so he did it on 24 January 2022.
On 10 April 2022, Khan lost the no-confidence motion in the National Assembly and his government ended. After that, the FIA put his name on the no-fly list while he was not holding any office in Pakistan at that time. After his name was removed from the no-fly list on 17th April 2022, he immediately fled to London via Dubai. In December 2022, he said, he started working as a Chief Liaison Officer in an international law firm in the UK.
In his legal notice, the claimant Shehzad Akbar said he continued to criticise corruption in Pakistan and remained “highly critical to the military establishment and government officials on social media and newspapers based outside Pakistan as he has not been able to campaign on Pakistani TV channels as the ISI has banned media agencies from providing him with a platform.”
Shahzad Akbar further wrote in the legal notice that “Pakistan has a history of suppressing political members who were at odds with the military establishment at that time and that the establishment had been targeting PTI members for more than two years.” He added that in 2018, Imran Khan started serving Pakistan as the 22nd Prime Minister with the backing of Pakistan’s powerful military establishment. In April 2022, after losing the backing of the military, Khan was voted out of his position through a vote of no confidence. He said Khan’s removal from office is “widely considered to have been orchestrated by the military elite of Pakistan.”
The claimant said on November 3, 2023 a life attempt was made on Khan wherein one was killed and several others injured. Khan alleged that Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, Interior Minister Rana Sanaullah and Intelligence Officer Major General Faisal Naseer, who is the Counter Intelligence DG of ISI, are behind the assassination attempt on him. He said Khan after being ousted from power in 2022, has been implicated in more than 175 cases, including the Cipher case, the toshakhana case, the land bribery case, and the case of incitement to violence under the Pakistan Corruption and Terrorism Act. In January 2024, Khan was sentenced to 10 years in prison for leaking state secrets and 14 years in the government exchequer case. In February 2024, Khan was handed seven years of jail sentence in an un-Islamic marriage case. These trials were widely considered to be unfair.
After Khan’s arrest, PTI supporters protested strongly against the military establishment and it was followed by a massive crackdown on the PTI men, censoring media organizations, shutting down internet services, kidnapping journalists, and torturing lawyers. After the events of May 9, the internet was shut down in Pakistan.
The claimant said that since June 2023, Imran Khan has been banned from the Pakistani media.
He said that in October 2022, senior PTI Senator Azam Swati was arrested by the FIA for criticizing former General Qamar Javed. Swati said in custody he was sexually assaulted and tortured allegedly on the order of DG CSII General Faisal Naseer and Sector Commander ISI Islamabad Brigadier Faheem Raza. The citizens have been systematically targeted in Pakistan who are critical of the establishment, the claimant said.
He further alleged that in January 2017, an eminent Pakistani blogger and human rights activist, Ahmad Waqass Goraya was abducted and tortured by the ISI, for criticising the military establishment. Later he escaped to the Netherlands. In June 2018, ISI officers visited the home of Waqas Ahmad Garaya’s parents in Pakistan and tortured them and other members as a matter of teaching Waqas Garaya a lesson, he went on to say.
He alleged that in February 2020, two men believed to have been instructed by the ISI attacked Waqass Ahmed in the Rotterdam area of the Netherlands. In February 2021, Dutch police removed Goraya from his home after receiving credible intelligence about threats to his life.
He alleged that in 2021, a British Pakistani citizen in the Netherlands accepted an offer of $100,000 to kill Goraya suspected to have been sought by the ISI. But the hitman failed and was arrested by the police and in 2022 he was found guilty of conspiracy to murder.
Shehzad says, as of 2018, Gul Bukhari a British Pakistani YouTuber and columnist who has openly criticized the Pakistani military and the Pakistani security forces, was abducted allegedly by the securities. After she was recovered, she fled to the UK. Metropolitan Police UK has advised her not to reveal her home to anyone as she is on Pakistan’s hit list.
He further alleged that in February 2020, Fazal Khan, a lawyer, initiated a court case against the Government of Pakistan and military officers. In July 2020, he survived an assassination attempt suspected to have been carried out on the orders of the ISI. Fazal Khan fled to the UK. In May 2022, Arshad Sharif was targeted for multiple violations of the Penal Court of Pakistan and received death threats. In July 2022, Arshad Sharif sent a letter to the Supreme Court notifying threats to his life and to seek judicial protection. In August 2022, Arshad Sharif fled to Dubai and he went to Kenya after Dubai authorities gave him 48 hours to leave Dubai. And in Kenya, he was brutally killed.
In the legal notice, Shahzad Akbar further wrote that the Pakistani embassy was used to trace out his residence in the UK. He alleged in 2023, he received threats from the ISI. On 14 November 2023, a certified letter was received from PHC which was with reference to the UK’s National Crime Agency. Regarding it, the claimant said, he expressed my concern to the NCA Police as there was no reason for the letter to be sent to his home address in the UK. In August 2022 and May 2022 and June 2023, he said, he replied to NAB’s questions in four separate letters as it was intimidating and coercing him into giving false testimony against Khan. Two weeks after those letters, on November 26, an acid attack was carried out at his house in Ruston, United Kingdom, when his daughters and wife were also present in the house. The unknown attackers threw acid on his face in an attempt to injure the eyes. This might have made him permanent and total blind, he said claiming that the attack was carried out by Pakistan or its agents. In the legal notice, he said that he wanted an apology from Pakistan for personal injury damages and a public apology here in the open court. He said in the notice that according to the three-action protocol, disputes are ready for solution and consideration for mutual solution. Pakistan Embassy should confirm receipt of this letter within 14 days and reply to this letter till June 10, 2024.
