Hafiz Abdul Basit

Who is Hafiz Abdul Basit?

Hafiz Abdul Basit is a citizen of Pakistan who is believed to have been detained on suspicion of involvement to assassinate Pakistan's leader President Pervez Musharraf.

A devout Muslim, Basit disappeared from his home on January 4, 2004, and was believed to have been taken into covert extrajudicial detention in a secret Pakistani interrogation center for the next three and a half years.

Tariq Pervez, the director-general of Pakistan's Federal Investigation Agency, was threatened with jail, unless he produced Basit. Pakistani Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad told him:

“It has been proved that you lifted the person and now you are responsible for the production of the detainee before this bench. Either produce the detainee or get ready to go to the dungeon.”

Pervez claims he was soon transferred to the custody of Pakistan's controversial intelligence agency, the Interservices Intelligence Directorate.

Pervez was allowed two brief, temporary, releases from the Court, to give him an opportunity to be arrange for Hafiz Abdul Basit to be released from his extrajudicial detention—without success. Pakistan's Attorney General Malik Qayyum intervened, and sought a further two day adjournment, taking responsibility for the release of Hafiz Abdul Basit. Hafiz Abdul Basit had still not been produced, before the Court, on August 22, 2007, when the two-day adjournment expired. The Pakistani newspaper Dawn reported that Qayyum told the Supreme Court: