A INTRODUCTION The Anti-Terrorism Act (ATA), Pakistan’s primary anti-terrorism legislation, was promulgated in 1997. The legislative intent underpinning the ATA was to increase the power of law enforcement agencies to prevent and investigate terrorism and create special courts to expedite trials of terrorist suspects¹. However, since its inception, the ability of the law to effectively convict terrorists and fulfil its mandate of reducing terrorism in the country has come under considerable criticism from various stakeholders. The limited ability of the law to fulfil its mandate gained renewed relevance, and as a result, increased scrutiny, in the wake of Pakistan lifting the de-facto six-year moratorium on the death penalty on December 17, 2014. The original objective of the reinstatement of the death penalty was to execute those convicted of terrorist offences² following the tragic terrorist attack on the Army Public School in Peshawar that resulted in the deaths of over 145 civilians, including 135 children. However, in March 2015, without any public justification, the moratorium was lifted for all those awarded the death penalty under Pakistan’s criminal laws, including for non-terrorism related offences. Since the moratorium was lifted, the Government of Pakistan has executed more than 480³ individuals, making it the fifth most prolific executioner in the world. Despite the government’s predominant narrative claiming that the death penalty is a necessary measure to curb terrorism, only 30 percent of those executed were convicted for crimes of terrorism.4 This statistic is greatly problematic in light of the original aim for which the moratorium was lifted - it clearly establishes that the majority of those being executed are not terrorists. There are currently more than 27 crimes that are punishable by death, a vast majority of which fail to meet the “most serious crimes” standard under international law⁵. In order to determine the efficacy of the ATA in combating terrorism, it is crucial to examine the ways in which it has essentially created a separate legal realm for terrorist offences. It stipulates a parallel set of procedures for the custody, detention, prosecution, and sentencing of terrorism suspects in the country, establishing special Anti-Terrorism Courts (ATCs) for the “speedy trial”⁶ of offences triable under the ATA and authorising policies such as the denial of bail to terrorist suspects, enhanced police powers, extended remand of suspects, preventive detention, and death penalty for certain offences. Additionally, the ATA’s broad, vague definition of terrorism has created regressive effects for those who may lawfully be 1 Anti-Terrorism Act, 1997[ATA], Preamble 2 See The Washington Post. "Pakistan Announces A National Action Plan To Fight Terrorism Says Terrorists' Days Are Numbered". 2014. Web. 13 June 2017. Available at https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2014/12/24/ pakistan-announces-a-national-plan-to-fight-terrorism-says-terrorists-days-are-numbered/?utm_term=.8a9367080ba6 3 Till September 30, 2017 4 See Exhibit A 5 International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, 999 U.N.T.S. 171, art 6(2)[ICCPR] 6 ATA, S 13(1) TRIAL AND TERROR 01