Summary CJP says that witnesses are not given protection.
ISLAMABAD (Dunya News): Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry on Saturday blamed the non-implementation of Anti-Terror Act for failure to achieve the desired results in controlling terrorism, adding that the matter of safety and protection of witnesses was very important.
He expressed these views while addressing the meeting in connection with monitoring of ATC cases and for improvement in the anti-terrorism courts.
The meeting was attended by senior judges of the Supreme Court and high courts. IGPs of all four provinces, home secretaries and prosecutor generals also attended the meeting.
Addressing the participants, Justice Iftikhar said the terror accused were being acquitted due to lack of concrete evidence, poor investigation and weak prosecution.
He said even witnesses were not given protection. He said that the matter of safety and protection of witnesses was very important and needed to be tackled on priority basis in the cases of terrorism and sectarian violence.
In sectarian cases, witnesses hesitate to come to courts to testify against the people accused of terrorism. Nobody could be given sentence without the concrete evidence.
He added that large number of terror suspects were released by ant-terrorism courts due to poor investigation and weak prosecution. It also demoralizes the personnel of the prosecution and investigating agencies, which need demoralized the society that perhaps nothing could be done to control and combat the acts of terrorism and commission of heinous offenses.
