According to unverified reports emanating from Pakistani social media, Pakistan Army on Saturday (23 November) hanged Brigadier Raja Rizwan (retd) for acting as a spy for a foreign intelligence agency, report The Print.

No independent or official confirmation of the hanging is available in the official forum and mainstream media has not reported about the incident. Journalists in Pakistan are still waiting for the official word from ISPR.

In May this year, the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), which is Pakistani military’s information agency, had issued a statement saying Army chief Genral Qamar Javed Bajwa had endorsed the death sentence.

In June Brigadier Rizwan, who was once Pakistani defence attaché in Germany and had retired in 2014, along with Pakistan’s former Director General of Military Operations, Lieutenant General Javed Iqbal (Retd) were accused of spying for the American Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).

Brigadier Rizwan and Wasim Akram, a civilian doctor employed by an army organisation, were sentenced to death while Lt Gen Iqbal, was sentenced to 14 years in jail.

On 22 February ISPR Chief Major General Asif Ghafoor had confirmed the arrests of the senior officers in a press conference.

At the time, he had said that the two cases were not linked to each other, and there was no network of spies as such, a claim that sources in the Indian establishment said was completely untrue.

CIA had recruited both of them earlier in their careers to get information on Pakistan’s nuclear programme and the Army’s plans and support to jihadi groups.