26 July 2011 :

Barrister Zafarullah Khan of Watan Party, filed a petition in the Supreme Court of Pakistan, seeking abolishment of the death penalty claiming it was in violation of the constitution.
The petition was filed before the Lahore registry of the apex court.
Khan stated that the rampant use of death penalty for murder was not only unconstitutional but also “illegal” and “cruel”. “Out of the total 213 countries in the world, only 68 are in favour of the death penalty,” Khan said.
He stated that Pakistan was constitutionally a democratic country, and the whole purpose of a democratic constitution was to guarantee people the security of life and ensure welfare facilities. “There is no doubt about the fact that there are several miscreants and violators of law who need to be punished and their activities need to be monitored,” Khan said, adding that violations and crime could be regulated by punishment of various terms rather than terminating criminals’ lives.
He stated that the right to life is a very basic right given to each citizen through Article 9 of the constitution, and keeping this in view, the death penalty was a form of unnatural termination of life, therefore, it violated this article of the constitution. He stated that the drafters of the Constitution of 1973 were aware of the abolition of death penalty in many countries, particularly in England, whose legal system we had knowingly adopted.