Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar said on Saturday that his comments in the United States about the case of Dr Aafia Siddiqui were being “taken out of context” in the wake of criticism of the remarks by her lawyer.
FM Dar is currently on a visit to the US. He spoke at the Atlantic Council in Washington, DC, a day ago, during which he had drawn a parallel with the case of Dr Aafia, who has spent years in a US prison, when responding to a question about former prime minister Imran Khan’s incarceration.
He noted that Pakistan did not interfere in that process because “the Americans had followed their judicial system”. Furthermore, he said, Imran was sentenced by Pakistan’s judiciary, following the due process of law. “When the due process is followed, others do not have the right to interfere,” he said.
Dr Aafia, a neuroscientist and educator, was convicted by the US District Court for the Southern District of New York on charges of attempted murder of US personnel in Afghanistan and has been serving her sentence at the Federal Medical Centre (FMC) Carswell in the US since 2010.
FM Dar’s remarks were criticised by her lawyer as being “idiotic”.
Subsequently, a post by FM Dar on X said: “Yesterday, in response to a question about Imran Khan’s case at the Atlantic Council think tank in Washington, the reference to Dr Aafia Siddiqui’s case is being taken out of context. During the tenures of PML-N governments, we have consistently provided all diplomatic and legal assistance for Dr Aafia Siddiqui’s release, and we will continue to do so until the matter of her release is resolved.”
He said every country had its judicial and legal procedures, which were to be respected, whether it was Pakistan or the US.
“Our government’s stance on the issue of Dr Aafia Siddiqui’s release is clear and unequivocal.”
Responding to Dar’s comments earlier in the day, Dr Aafia’s lawyer Clive Stafford Smith OBE said: “Sorry but this is idiotic! ‘Due process’ does not equal something where Aafia had no witnesses, they lied & it was all false. That’s called a miscarriage of justice not what’s ‘due’.”
Dar “appeared to be going out of his way to undermine Aafia’s case yesterday by acting like she got ‘due process’ when all she got was torture and a trial in New York when all the real witnesses were in Afghanistan”, he said in a separate post on X.
Speaking to Dawn.com, Smith said: “As you may have seen from the deputy PM’s statement, he was trying to justify what is happening to Imran Khan by using the Aafia Siddiqui case — saying her case is a result of ‘due process of law’ in the US and so therefore it is only something a judge can deal with.
“He goes on to say that disagreeing with a legal verdict against him does not give Imran Khan the right to provoke people to dissent, which should be done through the courts.”
Smith said that in his opinion, “I suspect we can all disagree with what he is saying: in all of the scores of people whom I have exonerated in the US, I have used publicity to help force the system to correct its mistakes, and obviously, in Aafia’s case, I tried to do that through the clemency process with Biden too.”
He said that FM Dar’s analogy was “unwise as well as misplaced”.
On the PTI founder’s incarceration and legal troubles, he said: “I suspect many people will disagree with the notion that Imran Khan has received anything that approaches ‘due process of law’ in the cases against him, just as we can agree that Aafia is where she is today due to the criminal actions of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), along with others, rather than any ‘due process’.”
He added that FM Dar should not talk about Dr Aafia’s case in the context of Imran’s cases.
“In every instance, Pakistan’s officials need to be towing the consistent line, set out in Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s excellent letter to Joe Biden, that no matter what you believe, Aafia has suffered enough,” Aafia’s lawyer added.
He added that he was very optimistic that Pakistan would continue with efforts to secure Dr Aafia’s release.
Speaking on the circumstances of her trial, Smith said: “The defence brought no witnesses to New York, not one.
“The prosecution brought the people they wanted — soldiers who all tried unsuccessfully to tell the same story, and an Afghan interpreter who was promised US residency and given a substantial amount of money.”
He said that the physical evidence solidly disproved the prosecution’s theory, even then, but before trial, the defence did not locate the videotape that proved beyond argument that the holes in the wall were not from Dr Aafia shooting, since they were from earlier that day.
“I have promised to file her appeal in New York in the next week or ten days,” Smith said.
A day ago, PM Shehbaz had assured Dr Fouzia Siddiqui that the government would continue to provide all possible legal and diplomatic support in the matter of her sister.
On July 12, the Islamabad High Court (IHC) had expressed dissatisfaction over the federal government’s failure to submit a report in the case concerning Dr Aafia’s release, health and repatriation, with Justice Ishaq threatening to “summon the entire cabinet” if the report was not presented. IHC Justice Sardar Ejaz Ishaq on July 21 had issued a contempt of court notice to the entire federal government, including the prime minister and all ministers, for refusing to file an amicus brief to support Dr Aafia’s case in the US.
However, the IHC Registrar Office had on Wednesday put on hold the processing of the contempt of court notices issued to PM Shehbaz and his cabinet members as the dealing staff decided to ascertain its validity first.
In February, the IHC was told that the proposal to exchange Shakil Afridi for Dr Aafia was unfeasible. The law officer representing the federal government informed the court that Smith had suggested the swap, but Pakistan and the US did not have any agreement for such an exchange.
Last year in October, PM Shehbaz had requested that Biden pardon and release Dr Aafia from jail.
In a letter dated October 13, the prime minister expressed his concerns about Dr Aafia’s “fragile mental and frail physical health” while in prison. “Now 52 years old, she has served 16 years behind bars in the US.
“Numerous Pakistani officials have paid consular visits to Dr Siddiqui … all of them have raised their serious concerns about the treatment she has received,” the letter read. “In fact, they fear she may take her own life.”
Consequently, the US State Department declined to comment on the letter written by PM Shehbaz to the Biden administration.
