An Islamabad district and sessions court has issued non-bailable arrest warrants for the widow of the late journalist Arshad Sharif, Summaiya Arshad, and the producer of his program on ARY News, Ali Usman. This action was taken due to their failure to comply with court summons and the repeated absence of witnesses to record their testimonies in Sharif’s murder case. Arshad Sharif was fatally shot in Kenya in October of the previous year.
Summaiya Arshad, who was the first wife of Arshad Sharif, stated that she had not received any summons from the court and only learned of the arrest warrants through media reports. She clarified that the FIR for her husband’s murder was filed by the state, not by the family. Therefore, she was unaware of the details of the case.
میرے ناقابل ضمانت وارنٹ گرفتاری کا میڈیا سے پتا چلا، اہلیہ ارشد شریف#ARYNews #ArshadSharifShaheed pic.twitter.com/rHB0B9HUsH
— ARY NEWS (@ARYNEWSOFFICIAL) September 9, 2023
Javeria Siddique, Sharif’s second wife, also confirmed that she had not received any summons from the sessions court. She expressed her belief that this situation was a form of victimization and harassment aimed at silencing Arshad Sharif’s family.
This is victimisation as I never received any summons and but i have seen on social media my house address is mentioned in it. This is harassment and another attempt to silent the family of slain journalist Arshad Sharif. This is a privacy breach why again and again my personal… https://t.co/KIqYT2IeDw
— Javeria Siddique (@javerias) September 9, 2023
The case itself involves the murder of Arshad Sharif, a prominent critic of the government and military establishment, who left Pakistan in August 2022 due to multiple sedition cases against him. He was initially in the UAE before traveling to Kenya, where he met his tragic end.
Initial reports suggested mistaken identity as the cause of his killing, but later accounts indicated that someone in Sharif’s car may have fired at paramilitary officers. The Pakistani government formed a team to investigate the killing, and a progress report was submitted to the Supreme Court.
The FIR for the murder, filed by the Islamabad police in December 2022, was at the behest of the Supreme Court. It cited Sections 302 (punishment for murder) and 34 (acts done by several persons in furtherance of common intention) of the Pakistan Penal Code.
Javeria Siddique questioned why the case was registered on the police’s complaint when Sharif’s family members were still alive, contending that only Sharif’s mother should have the authority to lodge the FIR.
Following the issuance of the warrant, hashtags #JusticeForArshadSharif and #StayStrongSumaiyaArshad began trending on Twitter.
