Islamabad: A Joint Investigation Team (JIT), constituted some 21 days after the kidnapping and murder of a senior officer of Peshawar Police, has decided to probe his murder afresh.

It will take into account all the circumstances surrounding his kidnapping from Islamabad and murder in Afghanistan later.

The seven-member JIT will record the statements of the staff and family members of Tahir Dawar, the Superintendent of Police (SP) Rural, Peshawar, and collect evidence in the police officer’s kidnapping and subsequent murder in Afghanistan’s Nangarhar province.

Dawar was kidnapped from Islamabad on October 26 and on November 13, his body was found by some locals in Nangarhar.

His body was handed over to the Pakistani authorities by the Afghan government on Thursday, only after negotiations between the two governments.

The entire matter sparked a diplomatic row between the two countries, with Pakistan expressing its disappointment over the Afghan government’s reluctance in handing over a senior police official’s body.

Speaking to Gulf News, a senior official of Islamabad police on Sunday said that in view of the sensitivity of the matter, the JIT includes members of the armed forces and secret agencies.

The seven-member investigation team — including a sub-divisional police officer, a deputy SP of the Crime Investigation Department, an Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) representative, a Military Intelligence (MI) member, an Intelligence Bureau (IB) official, and the investigating officer (IO) — is mandated to look into the incident and submit its report within 45 days.

The JIT — headed by SP Investigation of Islamabad Police, Gulfam Nasir, in its first meeting finalised the Terms of Reference (Tor) and decided to scrutinise CCTV camera recordings from the day of the kidnapping and even from the days prior, so it could ascertain when and how SP Dawar was kidnapped and how many persons were involved in the kidnapping.

The JIT will also examine the slain police officer’s phone records, and interview those who visited him most recently or on the day of the kidnapping.

Criticism

SP Dawar’s brother, Ahmmeduddin Dawar, has rejected the idea of the JIT, demanding an international probe into his brother’s murder.

Talking to the media, he said his brother went missing from an international city (Islamabad) and his body was found in another country, therefore an international probe team should carry out the investigation.

SP Dawar was the security in-charge of the rural circle of Peshawar and had survived a number of murder attempts and suicide blasts in the past. Due to security threats, he had been living in Islamabad.

Considered a bold and upright officer of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) Police, he had always led from the front.

Islamabad Police has also included sections of antiterrorism act in the FIR filed on his murder.

Initially, the case was registered under Section 365 (kidnapping) of the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC), but on Friday the police included 302 and 7-ATA (Anti-Terrorism Act) in the FIR.