• Suspect vacillates between confessing and refusing to confess in court.
• Mustafa’s murder was “a sudden outburst”, says Armaghan.
• Court orders suspect to be presented before anti-terrorism court.
  

KARACHI: A local court on Saturday rejected the request by the prime accused in the Mustafa Amir murder case, Armaghan, to record his confessional statement citing concerns regarding his mental state. 

The court’s decision to reject Armaghan’s plea for a statement under Section 164 of the Criminal Procedure Code, came after he reportedly vacillated between confessing and refusing to provide a statement in the court of judicial magistrate (South).

During the hearing, the suspect initially agreed to confess to the crime. However, he subsequently retracted his statement, leading the court to question his mental stability.

“The accused is not in a stable condition as to record his confession,” the court stated in its order.

According to the court’s order, upon being presented to the court, Armaghan — who seemed to be “lazy and tired” — initially expressed that he wanted to confess his guilt and said that he had killed Mustafa due to a previous grudge.

However, the accused claimed that Mustafa’s murder was not the result of pre-planning and was rather “a sudden outburst”.

Later, when Armaghan was informed that whether or not he confessed, he would be remanded to judicial custody, he refused to confess and said that he was being “framed by Jewish mafia” and Israeli intelligence agency, Mossad, the court order revealed.

“Jewish mafia has been after me since long,” claimed Armaghan in court, before accusing Mustafa’s mother of being a member of the ‘Jewish lobby’ as well.

Subsequently, the suspect claimed once again that he did not kill Mustafa. He added that he had rather left Mustafa in the car and set the front side of the vehicle on fire, leaving Mustafa’s fate up to God.

After a pause, the accused once again urged that he was not “directly” involved in Mustafa’s murder, claiming that his death at the time was written in his fate.

Furthermore, the accused attacked the country’s political parties, accusing them of being part of the ‘Jewish lobby’ as well, and that the ‘Jewish mafia’ wanted to sideline him as he was outspoken against them.

Following the hearing, the court dismissed the investigating authorities’ request and issued directives to have Armaghan presented before the anti-terrorism court.

The latest development comes after the Anti-Violent Crime Cell (AVCC) of the Karachi Police arrested Kamran Asghar Qureshi — Armaghan’s father — and a local court remanded him into police custody for two days in a case related to illegal weapons and drug possession.

Mustafa Amir murder case

The whole saga unfolded after Armaghan opened fire at a team of the AVCC — a specialised unit of the Karachi police responsible for tackling cases related to murder and extortion — during a raid at his residence in Karachi’s DHA on February 8.

The deceased’s body — found by police in a car near the Hub checkpost on January 12 and buried by the Edhi Foundation on January 16 — was exhumed and later buried by his family following the identity confirmation in the initial DNA report.

Meanwhile, the police have already handed over the laptops recovered from Armaghan’s residence to the FIA along with his mobile phones for necessary analysis.

Furthermore, the black-and-silver American iron folding rod, allegedly used by Armaghan to beat Mustafa, has also been recovered from the Hub area, an officer confirmed to The News.

Police consider this recovery a breakthrough that would significantly strengthen the case against Armaghan and help secure his conviction. The officer disclosed that Armaghan is no longer as defiant as before.