Court rejects Musharraf security fears in Bugti’s killing issue

QUETTA, Pakistan: A Pakistani court on Saturday dismissed a petition by former military dictator Pervez Musharraf for his trial over the death of a rebel leader to be transferred due to security fears.
Musharraf was head of state in 2006 when the main rebel leader in the southwestern province of Baluchistan, Akbar Bugti, died during an army operation.
The retired general, who returned to Pakistan from four years of self-imposed exile in March, has been under house arrest at his villa on the edge of Islamabad since April 19.
He is facing charges in several high-profile cases, including the 2007 murder of former Pakistan Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, as well as the killing of Bugti.
Musharraf’s lawyers on Saturday asked the chief justice of Baluchistan High Court to shift his trial over Bugti’s death to Rawalpindi, twin city of the capital Islamabad, in Punjab province.
“The court has dismissed our petition saying it is not maintainable,” Ilyas Siddiqui, a lawyer who represented Musharraf in the court in southwestern city of Quetta, told AFP.
“We had requested that Musharraf has serious security threats in Baluchistan so his case be shifted from the province but the judge did not agree,” Siddiqui said.
Earlier, the chief justice of the Baluchistan High Court allowed the provincial government to withdraw a similar petition.
An interim government, set up in the province to conduct general elections on May 11, had filed a request in the Baluchistan court for the case to be transferred for security reasons.
However the newly elected provincial government, which took power in June, withdrew the application and informed the court that they could provide security to Musharraf.