Cypher case: State lawyers appointed for Imran, Qureshi over lawyers disappearance

Rawalpindi: The Official Secrets Act Special Court has appointed official counsels for Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) founder Imran Khan and vice- chairman Shah Mehmood Qureshi due to the non-appearance of their defense lawyers in the cypher case.

According to the details, the Official Secret Act Special Court issued the ruling for the yesterday’s hearing. The court has appointed public counsel for former Prime Minister and former Foreign minister in the cypher case.

It has been said in the decree that when the hearing of the case started, no senior counsel appeared on behalf of the accused, the hearing of the case was resumed at 12:30pm even then no senior counsel appeared.

In view of the facts and circumstances, the accused’s lawyer were given several opportunities and the court was left with no option but to appoint a State Defense Council for the accused.

The court stated that a list of lawyers was requested from the Advocate General through email, the office of Advocate General Islamabad responded via letter and provided the names of qualified lawyers in the letter.

According to the decree, Malik Abdul Rehman Advocate has been appointed as State Defense Council for founder PTI while Hazrat Yunus Advocate has been appointed as State Defense Council for Shah Mehmood Qureshi.

Now these two state lawyers will cross-examine the witnesses on January 27 representing the accused.

It is pertinent to note that yesterday the Special Court Judge Abul Hasnat Zulqarnain hearing the cypher case got upset because of the non-appearance of defense councel.

During the hearing, the lawyers of the accused, Salman Akram Raja, Sikandar Zulqarnain andAli Bukhari, did not appear in the court The witnesses could not be cross-examined due to the non-appearance of the central lawyers of the accused. The court also granted two respite to the Central Advocate consel to appear, still they did not show up.

As incident of harsh conversation between Shah Mehmood Qureshi, founder PTI Imran Khan and Judge Abul Hasnat took place in during the hearing of the cipher case. 

Following the conversation, Shah Mehmood snatched a file from the State Defense Councel and hit it on the wall. Responding to which the judge issued a warning for him.

After which Judge Abul Hasnat also misbehaved which Imran Khan.