NEW DELHI: Pakistan’s Supreme Court, on Wednesday, ruled that former prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, who was hanged 44 years ago after being convicted of murder, did not receive a fair trial.
Bhutto, the founder of the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), which is currently led by his grandson and former foreign minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, was executed in 1979 under the military regime of the late General Zia-ul-Haq.
Chief Justice Qazi Faez Isa said that the court unanimously found that the requirements of a fair trial and due process were not met. Prime minister Shehbaz Sharif praised the ruling, stating that it corrected a previous injustice. The ruling was made in response to a judicial reference filed by Bhutto Zardari’s father, Asif Ali Zardari, during his presidency in 2011.
The reference requested the top court’s opinion on revisiting the death sentence of the PPP founder. Bhutto Zardari expressed his satisfaction with the ruling, stating that his family had waited for three generations to hear these words. The court will release a detailed order at a later date.
Political commentator Yousuf Nazar, a close aide of the late Benazir Bhutto, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s daughter and a former prime minister who was assassinated in 2007, described the ruling as an acknowledgement of a grave miscarriage of justice during Zia’s martial law regime.
Human rights groups have criticized Zia’s dictatorship for its repression of democracy, persecution of PPP members, and public punishment of opponents. Nazar also pointed out that the regime’s support for militant groups during the Soviet-Afghan war led to a rise in extremism and militancy within the country.