ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif is holding a meeting with Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Qazi Faez Isa to discuss allegations leveled by Islamabad High Court (IHC) judges accusing the country’s spy agencies of interfering in judicial affairs, Geo News reported on Thursday.
When visiting the Supreme Court, the Prime Minister is accompanied by the Prosecutor General and the Minister of Law.
The meeting comes after six IHC judges — Justice Mohsin Akhtar Kiyani, Justice Tariq Mehmood Jahangiri, Justice Babar Sattar, Justice Sardar Ejaz Ishaq Khan, Justice Arbab Muhammad Tahir and Justice Saman Rafat Imtiaz — wrote to the Supreme Judicial Council (SJC) to convene a judicial convention in matters of alleged interference by members of the executive branch, including intelligence service personnel, in judicial matters.
The letter further emphasized that the code of conduct for judges prescribed by the Supreme Judicial Council provides no guidance on how “they must respond to or report incidents that amount to intimidation and interfere with the independence of the judiciary.”
A day earlier, a full court session of the high court was held in the federal capital to consider a letter from the judges seeking advice from the Supreme Judicial Council “with respect to the duty of a judge to report and respond to actions by members of the executive branch, including intelligence officers, who seek to interfere with the performance of his official functions and qualify as intimidation”.
The two-hour meeting convened by CJP Isa came after the Bar Associations of Sindh, Lahore, Islamabad and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa as well as senior lawyers demanded an inquiry into the letter, which could likely have serious implications for the country’s judiciary.
A separate High Court action was also filed seeking an open judicial inquiry into the IHC judges’ letter.
The constitutional petition, filed by Mian Dawood Advocate, seeks the constitution of an empowered commission to probe the “pre-prepared” letter.
