WORLD> Asia-Pacific
Former Pakistani Chief Justice not to be restored
(Xinhua)
Updated: 2008-09-05 14:06

ISLAMABAD  -- The Pakistan People's Party (PPP) has decided in principle not to restore the deposed Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry and his fellow judges, local newspaper The News reported on Friday.

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The News quoted PPP spokesman Farhatullah Babar as saying that Prime Minister Syed Yousaf Raza Gillani had been duly informed in this regard.

Gillani has declared in the Senate that the deposed judges would be restored and the 17th Amendment of the Constitution would be repealed.

The top leadership of the PPP has formally informed Gillani that Chaudhry and some other judges would not be restored and he should stop promising their restoration publicly, according to The News.

Some 60 judges were sacked on November 3 last year when then- President Pervez Musharraf declared a state of emergency. The PPP and its former coalition partner Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML- N) promised in March that the judges would be restored.

Attorney General Latif Khosa has told the media besides Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry, other senior Supreme Court judges, if they wanted to be restored, would have to work under Chief Justice Dogar who, he said, was the constitutional Chief Justice of the country, according to The News.