Pakistan army chief General Raheel Sharif on Thursday signed death warrants of six terrorist, whose execution was pending.
The six terrorists were convicted by a military court in accordance with the law. The men are expected to be executed within the next 48 hours, Dawn.com reports.
"COAS (Chief of Army Staff) today (Thursday) signed death warrants of 6 hardcore terrorists (pending execution) convicted by FGCM (field general court martial) in accordance with law," military spokesman Major General Asim Bajwa tweeted.
Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif announced lifting of a moratorium on the death penalty after a round table conference of political parties soon after the deadly terrorist attack on the Army Public School in Peshawar in which at least 132 school children were massacred.
PTI adds: According to media reports jail authorities in Karachi, Faisalabad, Lahore and Sukkur have been given instructions to start making preparations for the execution of 17 high profile terrorists who have been sentenced to death.
These include Aqeel alias Usman, the mastermind of the terrorist attack on the army headquarters in Rawalpindi who is presently jailed in Faisalabad, Niaz Muhammad who carried out the attempted assassination bid on former military dictator Pervez Musharraf, Nur Badshah who carried out an attack on former prime minister Shaukat Aziz, and Sheikh Omar Saeed in the Hyderabad jail who is facing death for the killing of American journalist Daniel Pearl in 2002, and Fazal Hameed.
The last execution was carried out in Pakistan in 2008 after which the government imposed a moratorium on carrying out death sentences.
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