Schizophrenia not a mental illness, according Pakistan’s top court

• Eastern Eye Staff
• 21 October, 2016

By: Eastern Eye Staff

Pakistan’s top court has ruled that schizophrenia does not fall within its legal definition of mental disorders, clearing the way for the execution, as soon as next week, of a mentally ill man convicted of murder. Government doctors in 2012 certified Imdad Ali, 50, as being a paranoid schizophrenic, after he was convicted and sentenced to death for the 2001 murder of a cleric. His lawyers say Ali is unfit to be executed as he is unable to understand his crime and punishment, and that doing so would violate Pakistan’s obligations under a United Nations treaty, the International Covenant on…

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