Pakistan Reader# 740, 6 April 2024
Dhriti Mukherjee
In Focus
On 5 April, authorities found ten more suspicious letters, of which some were laced with “toxic” powder and threatening contents, addressed to Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, Punjab Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz, and judges of higher courts, including Chief Justice Qazi Faez Isa. Police officers explained to Dawn that the police team took the letters into custody after being informed by the Supreme Court’s staff about the receipt of the letters. A fresh case will not be registered; instead, the five new letters to the judges will be mentioned in a supplementary statement in the FIR already registered at the Counter-Terrorism Department (CTD). Security officials are additionally using surveillance cameras of the Punjab Safe City Authority to trace the dispatchers of the letters, with the home department deciding that the judges’ staff should be given scanners with which suspicious envelopes can be scanned before opening. With regard to the letters addressed to Sharif, Nawaz, and Isa, a senior police officer said that the letter contained a newspaper clipping in which there was “nothing serious, only fake news.” On the same day, the Director General of Pakistan Post directed postmasters to alert offices throughout the country to be vigilant while handling mail addressed to high-profile offices. (Mohammad Asghar & Munaweer Azeem, “More judges receive letters with ‘toxic’ powder,” Dawn, 6 April 2024)
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