Raymond Davis Case: Arraignment for twin murder tomorrow

[VCheng]

I, for one, will continue to wait for the courts to proceed with due process withOUT any preconceived notions about what the judgment should be. A formal federal government response deciding the issue of immunity and hence jurisdiction is yet to be filed.

I think a part of my post bears repeating here.

 

[Awesome]

As noted in the earlier thread without any dispute, Pakistan's treaty obligations are such that Admin staff have criminal immunity. "No two ways about it."

Such treaties become law in Pakistan only through local implementations of the same thing. The law is implemented through the FO Manual.

Uh-uh. The question is one of jurisdiction, not guilt. Davis can still be pursued in U.S. courts. Diplomats usually get off "scot-free" because the host country doesn't bother to do so. Don't you think if Davis is kicked out of the country the government of Pakistan will?

As I said, the entire world has to change how it works then, Pakistan is on the side of the right.

Davis will continue to assert his immunity, as is proper.

After Wednesday that won't matter.

Sure you do. It's called North Wazirstan.

We're coming for the drones next. Already Johnathan Banks had to make a run for it, like a petty criminal may I add, the entire CIA mission will have to wrap up if it doesn't start obeying Pakistani dictates.

What for? So you can excuse yourself and submit to the terror, mob violence, anger, and injustice bred in your own society?

Giving in to barbarism is easy. Being civilized is not.

What for? Because killing someone is wrong.

 

[Awesome]

I think a part of my post bears repeating here.

The FO has refused to make a decision, it only sumitted the documents it has had, the documents say no immunity.

The most important of which being:

 

[Solomon2]

Such treaties become law in Pakistan only through local implementations of the same thing. The law is implemented through the FO Manual.

If Pakistan can't hold to its treaty obligations and Pakistanis like yourselves care nothing for national honor, perhaps Pakistan's embassies should be closed and - taking pages out of the East Pakistan book - replaced by "local implementations" instead? How many hundreds of thousands will die as a result this time? After all, what you've claimed is that negotiating with the Pakistani government is meaningless.

We're coming for the drones next.

So the Pakistanis who killed Pakistanis in Swat and S. Wazirstan and fled to N. Wazirstan get a pass in your book, while the foreigners intent on protecting them from terrorist tyranny do not.

What for? Because killing someone is wrong.

Do you think that many Pakistanis, if presented with the choice of allowing themselves to be robbed and maybe killed at gunpoint, or killing the would-be robbers first, would agree with you? Do you claim that when Muslims are killing non-Muslims, too? And if so, what justice do you have to offer to substantiate your claim?

Asim, your arguments have descended down the scale from merely misleading to mostly pathetic. Which Pakistanis can possibly benefit from your policy prescriptions? None at all! Read the latest Fair article and tell me what you think: link

 

[Pak_Sher]

To all of you Pakistanis (and others) worried so much about taking the right decision and sentencing Davis in US court for his actions: We all know that you are talking nonsense, this thread only exist because Davis is an American. If he was a Muslim or from friendly country to Pakistan (like China), he would have never been arrested - and you would care less. Almost every day innocent people killed in Pakistan and you are not alarmed, but when an American kill two armed persons, probably in self defence, you stir this commotion.

This case just exposed your hatred towards the US, nothing else.

BTW, Davis will be released very soon!!! Mark my words. Some kind of rotten deal in traditional Pakistani style will emerge.

Keep your fingers crossed for the verdict. Yes, RD will be released after the due course. There is not hatred of the US, I am not sure why you are trying to manipulate the situation? So, if US arrests Jonathan Pollard who was an Israeli Spy and involved in espionage, is it because of the US hatred of Israel or is because he broke the law?

I have seen Israelis in general get stuck on one thing and keep going in circles like beating a dead horse.

 

[Awesome]

If Pakistan can't hold to its treaty obligations and Pakistanis like yourselves care nothing for national honor, perhaps Pakistan's embassies should be closed and - taking pages out of the East Pakistan book - replaced by "local implementations" instead? How many hundreds of thousands will die as a result this time? After all, what you've claimed is that negotiating with the Pakistani government is meaningless.

More empty threats, equating your murdering rights with national honor. Please don't sully your nation's honor by equating it to your right to murder. If being a psychopath murderer is honor in your books, I'm content being dishonorable. If the US wants to shut down Pak embassies in response, then that's its wish, but that threat won't change the fact that, you can't have Davis back.

So the Pakistanis who killed Pakistanis in Swat and S. Wazirstan and fled to N. Wazirstan get a pass in your book, while the foreigners intent on protecting them from terrorist tyranny do not.

Actually we killed those enemies of Pakistan, its only natural we start hunting for others. No one gets a free pass.

Do you think that many Pakistanis, if presented with the choice of allowing themselves to be robbed and maybe killed at gunpoint, or killing the would-be robbers first, would agree with you? Do you claim that when Muslims are killing non-Muslims, too? And if so, what justice do you have to offer to substantiate your claim?

Being robbed is actually a good defence and Davis should be freed if he killed them in a gunfight in self-defence. But for that you need a trial, which we are giving him.

Asim, your arguments have descended down the scale from merely misleading to mostly pathetic. Which Pakistanis can possibly benefit from your policy prescriptions? None at all! Read the latest Fair article and tell me what you think: link

My arguments are holding true and are being followed by learned and experienced men of Law in Pakistan. Every single theory of yours has failed to play out. The necessity of this trial is that it sets a precedent. Davis may be not guilty and may have acted in self-defence, but then we would have set a precedent. The next American killer would be tried too, then the next, and the next. The trial is more important than the sentence Davis receives.

Moreover being a CIA contractor sent to kill Pakistanis at the behest of the USG, I highly doubt he'd be let off. In fact perhaps Obama should hand over more officials from Langley whoever were involved in ordering the hit.

 

[Awesome]

No record Davis diplomat, court told | Pakistan | News | Newspaper | Daily | English | Online

LAHORE - The Foreign Ministry informed the Lahore High Court (LHC) on Monday that Raymond Davis, the double murder accused, came to Pakistan on an official business visa issued on the request made by the American authorities and that Raymond Allen Davis is his actual name as notified by the US Embassy in Pakistan.

Deputy Attorney General (DAG) Naveed Inayat Malik, on behalf of the Federal Ministry for Foreign Affairs, furnished a reply to four petitions against diplomatic immunity for Davis. They reply, however, fell short of clearly articulating Davis is a diplomat or not.

Another report quoted from the DAG’s reply that the ministry’s record is silent (or blank) if Davis is a diplomat.

The DAG denied any alteration, on the part of the ministry, in the official record relating to Davis or that the ministry was interfering in the investigations of the case. He told LHC Chief Justice Ijaz Ahmad Chaudhry that the US Embassy approached the ministry on January 27 with a request to release Davis to the custody of US Consul General in Lahore.

The DAG said as the embassy claimed Davis was holding a diplomatic passport, the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations and the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations may be consulted (by the court) to address the points raised through the present petitions.
The law officer, however, did not come up with any precise answer to the question of diplomatic status of Raymond Davis nor he presented to the court any certificate in terms of section 4 of the Diplomatic and Consular Privileges Act of 1972 despite a strong call from the petitioner’s counsel, Muhammad Azhar Siddique.

With reference to the trial of Raymond Davis, the law officer said the case was already sub judice before a trial court on account of the murders, and the question relating to the status of the accused may also be taken up there. To the point whether Davis was an employee of the US Embassy and if he enjoyed diplomatic status, the ministry offered a ‘suggested reply’ invoking the last order made by the court on a petition by Ch Ahmad Masood, saying the court has already taken cognizance of the matter, and if any matter of immunity arises in future, it can be determined by the court. The law officer said the Foreign Ministry is fully conversant with its obligations under the Constitution and it was not interfering in the investigations or the record.

---------- Post added at 10:56 AM ---------- Previous post was at 10:56 AM ----------

Now if the US consulate believes it has any record of Pakistan granting Davis immunity then please come forward.

 

[nirreich]

Keep your fingers crossed for the verdict. Yes, RD will be released after the due course. There is not hatred of the US, I am not sure why you are trying to manipulate the situation? So, if US arrests Jonathan Pollard who was an Israeli Spy and involved in espionage, is it because of the US hatred of Israel or is because he broke the law?

I have seen Israelis in general get stuck on one thing and keep going in circles like beating a dead horse.

The Polard case is completely different: nobody claimed for his immunity. And yes, keeping him in prison for so many years shows how angry and hurt the US defence establishment was on Israel's actions.

If there was no hatred in Pakistan against the US, nobody would have a problem for him to be sentenced in his own country, and no one would discuss the technicality of diplomatic immunity and make of it such a big issue. As I said, if instead of RD his name was Jiang Jintao, and he worked for China, nobody would care less where he is sentenced and what are the legal aspects of his case.

 

[nirreich]

As I though, Davis will be released soon. A rotten deal is on its way...

From the DAWN today:

ISLAMABAD: The Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) are close to a reset in their knotty relations, with behind-the-scene negotiations reportedly making progress.

A breakthrough is likely in days ahead.

An end to the feud will not only help resolve the dispute over immunity for jailed CIA operative Raymond Davis but also help both countries overcome the hard patch in their ties.

“There are some positive developments in ongoing negotiations,” a security official told Dawn on Monday without specifying how much ground the two sides had covered.

He, however, said both sides were ‘grudgingly accommodating each other’ to save the overall bilateral relationship.

Though there are hardly any evident markers to judge progress in dialogue on affairs of spy agencies, US Embassy’s reaction to the Lahore High Court (LHC) avoiding a ruling on immunity for Davis was quite telling.

US Embassy Spokesman Alberto Rodriguez, in a very brief comment, said: “US position is well known and we are working with Pakistani authorities to resolve the issue.”

His reaction definitely contrasted that of Ambassador Cameron Munter after the previous hearing in the case by the LHC (Feb 17), when he said: “The United States is disappointed that the government of Pakistan did not certify that Raymond Davis has diplomatic immunity”.

The immunity dispute quite expectedly remained unresolved in the LHC because Davis is no more central to this controversy, which has been overtaken by other matters pertaining to the problematic Pakistan-US security cooperation whose bedrock is the collaboration between ISI and CIA.

The Davis episode was just the latest manifestation of the disquiet in the relations between the agencies that had been going on for some time and had found varying expressions, be it the frequent CIA allegations of Pakistanis patronising jihadi groups and being insincere in fight against extremists or filing of a law suit in a New York court by relatives of Mumbai carnage against ISI chief or blowing the cover of CIA’s Islamabad station head Jonathan Banks, leading to his recall.

Notwithstanding what face this friction in ties got from time to time, US officials confirm that there had been divergences over strategic interests and timing of anti-militancy operations—a reference to Pakistan military’s reluctance to go after the North Waziristan-based Haqqani network.

As the situation reached the tipping point and both the agencies engaged in an ugly public spat, ISI sought a redefinition of its terms of engagement with CIA.

ISI’s litany of complaints against CIA included the American agency developing its own network of undeclared spies and disregarding ISI as an institution and sacrifices of its personnel.

The progress in negotiations achieved so far, a source said, was made possible because of cool heads on both sides, who realised that keeping the ISI-CIA relationship intact was in the interest of both the agencies.

Analysts believe the outcome of the dialogue was crucial for settling the row over immunity for Davis.

Breakthrough likely in ISI-CIA talks | Newspaper | DAWN.COM

 

[Awesome]

nirreich, you know what is sooner? Wednesday. When the trial will resume.

 

[nirreich]

nirreich, you know what is sooner? Wednesday. When the trial will resume.

We all know what the judicial system in Pakistan worth... If the ISI wants Davis to be released, he would be released.

Soon, very soon...

 

[Zeeshan360]

We all know what the judicial system in Pakistan worth... If the ISI wants Davis to be released, he would be released.

Soon, very soon...

Yeah indeed very soon

 

[Awesome]

Davis to be arraigned for twin murder tomorrow

LAHORE: U.S citizen Raymond Davis double murder case will come up for hearing tomorrow in the Kot Lakhpat jail, when the accused would be finally arraigned.

Additional Session Judge Yusuf Ojla is hearing the Raymond Davis case.

Following the indictment, formal trial of the case would begin from the next hearing, legal experts said.

Earlier, the Additional Session Judge had rejected the petition claiming Raymond Davis diplomatic immunity.

On the other hand, the attorney of the family of the victims Faizan and Faheem, Asad Manzoor Butt told Geo News that the case against Raymond Davis was strong, as the U.S embassy has failed to submit any evidence of his employment.

 

[Awesome]

We all know what the judicial system in Pakistan worth... If the ISI wants Davis to be released, he would be released.

Soon, very soon...

Then you just proved your ignorance on the matter. The Judiciary caused the downfall of the CoAS, and the federal government alike. It will assert its independence and make the call by the book.

 

[Rafael]

Yeah indeed very soon

How soon? We have been hearing this "very soon" for more than a month. Kindly spread some of your pearls of wisdom Bharti.