After a major blow at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in the Kulbhushan Jadhav case, Pakistan is contemplating a new legal team, as per the media of the neighbouring country.
Pakistan’s Foreign Affairs advisor Sartaj Aziz said they will appoint a new set of lawyers to represent the case and defend their position at the world court in The Hague in Netherlands.
However, Aziz said that their counsel had “courageously” fought at the ICJ. The legal team of Pakistan was led by Khawar Qureshi.
Pakistani experts and opposition parties slammed the Nawaz Sharif government for “mishandling” the case.
The 11-judge bench of ICJ on Thursday ruled that Pakistan cannot execute Jadhav until the “final decision”.
“Pakistan shall take all measures at its disposal to ensure that Jadhav is not executed pending the final decision in these proceedings,” ICJ President Ronny Abraham said.
The verdict came 10 days after India approached the UN’s top court for “provisional measure” of protection, an interim relief, in the Jadhav case.
The death sentence to Jadhav was handed out by a Pakistani military court on 10 April on charges of espionage. The court claimed that Jadhav was an Indian intelligence agent and a threat to Pakistan. He was allegedly caught in Balochistan in March 2016.
However, India has denied all claims, saying Jadhav is an “innocent Indian abducted by Pakistan from Iran”. India had said that hanging him would be a “premeditated murder”.
India had weaved its case around the fact that the neighboring country didn’t give consular access to the prisoner.