LAHORE: An anti-terrorism court in Lahore is expected to announce the verdict in the mob killing of a Sri Lankan factory manager on Monday.
The mob of factory employees in Sialkot tortured and burned Priyantha Kumara in December in an attack that then-prime minister Imran Khan said brought shame on the nation.
According to police, rumours spread that Kumara had “torn down a religious poster and thrown it in the dustbin” and that up to 120 people had been arrested, including one of the main accused.
Several gruesome video clips shared on social media showed a mob beating the prone victim while chanting slogans against blasphemy.
The victim’s body was returned to Sri Lankan high commission in Islamabad and then flown to his home country.
A first information report (FIR) was registered against 900 workers of the business, Rajco Industries, on the application of Uggoki Station House Officer (SHO) Armaghan Maqt under sections 302, 297, 201, 427, 431, 157, 149 of the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC) and 7 and 11-WW of the Anti-Terrorism Act (ATA).
Scores of suspects were arrested in the following days. The court indicted 89 people, nine of them minors, who were suspected of killing the man.
“The investigation and trial were completed by a five-member team headed by public prosecutor Abdul Rauf Wattoo,” reported Geo News, adding that one last hearing would be conducted in Kot Lakhpat prison in Lahore “after which it is expected that the judgment will be read out.”
“During the trial, presided over by judge Natasha Naseem, the prosecution brought to court 46 eyewitnesses,” the report added.
“Furthermore, it submitted as evidence the CCTV footage of 10 cameras installed at the site of the murder, as well as videos taken from the mobile phones of 55 accused men.”
A senior Pakistan official told AFP that Islamabad had been in touch with Sri Lankan diplomats over the incident “and have assured them that all those involved in the heinous crime will be brought to justice”.
Some politicians and activists argued that broader societal and political change was needed, beyond legal consequences for those involved.
“Arrests should of course be made, but there has to be a clear appraisal of why mobs feel the impunity,” said Senator Sherry Rehman, a member of the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP).
— With input from Reuters, AFP
