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Pakistan's Top Court Stays Execution Of Mentally Ill Man


FILE: The Supreme Court building in Islamabad.
FILE: The Supreme Court building in Islamabad.

The Supreme Court of Pakistan has suspended the execution of a former police officer who is mentally ill.

A two-judge panel is set to hear a petition to save Khizar Hayat's life by his mother on January 14, the court said.

Hayat was sentenced to death in 2003 over the shooting of a police officer and was first diagnosed as a schizophrenic in 2008 by prison medical authorities.

The man was scheduled to be executed on January 15.

Pakistan is a signatory of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, an international convention guaranteeing the dignity of individuals with disabilities.

The country lifted a six-year moratorium on the death penalty after Islamist militants killed more than 150 people at a school in the northwestern city of Peshawar in December 2014.

Based on reporting by AP and dpa

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