Murtaza Bhutto

MURTAZA BHUTTO TRIBUNAL PRESS REPORTER
RECORDS HIS STATEMENT BEFORE TRIBUNAL
From: Iqbal Qureshi
KARACHI, Dec 11, 1996: Najeeb Ahmed, Crime reporter of the daily Jung ,
on Wednesday said that on September 20 last at about 9.15 p.m. he was near
the 70-Clifton and on finding late Mir Murtaza and Ashiq Hussain Jatoi
seriously injured shouted at the policemen standing nearby as to why were
they not shifting the injured to the hospital.
After sometime an armoured carrier car reached near the four private
vehicles parked in a row opposite the Clifton Garden and the ASP Roy Tahir
got down from it and opened the left side door of the blue coloured Pajero.
Mir Murtaza Bhutto seemed to be seriously injured got down on his own but
staggered and with the support of Roy Tahir and some policemen was put in
the police mobile in its rear portion.
He found Ashiq Hussain Jatoi, seated in the driver s seat with his head
kneeled down on the steering wheel. As there was no movement in his body,
he came to the conclusion that he was perhaps dead. Najeeb was recording
his evidence before the 3-member enquiry tribunal probing into the causes
and circumstances of the police firing on the motorcade of Mir Murtaza near
his 70-Clifton on his return from Surjani Town after addressing a public
meeting on September 20 last at about 8.35 p.m.
Headed by Mr. Justice Nasir Aslam Zahid, Judge of the Supreme Court of
Pakistan. It consists of Mr Justice Amanullah Abbasi and Mr. Justice Dr
Ghous Mohammad, of the Sindh High Court. Najeeb said that he knew ASP
Roy Tahir before, but did not have intimate relations with him.
He did not know if the ASP Roy Tahir had accompanied late Mir Murtaza to
the hospital. The policemen present there had threatened him for his presence
on the scene of the incident and had been asking him to get lost. In the
meantime, a group of Press reporters and photographers reached there near
the DIG Karachi s bungalow and the policemen started manhandling the
press people and snatching cameras from the photogrpahers. Giving the
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