Family waits for report on Pakistani journalist’s killing

By IANS/AKI,

Lahore : An investigative report on the murder of Pakistani journalist Syed Saleem Shahzad is not likely be released as planned in November, said Shahzad’s brother-in-law Hamza Amer.


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“The verdict was supposed to be announced in November. That is what the president of the Pakistani Federal Union of Journalists said,” Amer told Adnkronos International.

“Until now members of the commission have not announced any developments.”

Amer said the investigation headed by Pakistani Supreme Court judge Mian Saqib Nisarhas not turned up anything concrete.

The badly beaten body of Shahzad, who worked as a correspondent for Adnkroknos International and was Southeast Asia bureau chief for the Asia Times Online, was found in a canal 150 km southwest of Islamabad May 31, two days after he disappeared from the capital.

Suspicion over the 40-year-old father-of-three’s murder has fallen strongly on Pakistan’s spy agency ISI, which in an unusual move denied involvement in his death.

Days before Shahzad’s disappearance he published an article in Asia Times Online alleging links between Al Qaeda and officials in the Pakistani navy.

Over 70 journalists have been killed in the line of duty in Pakistan since 2000.

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