According to new reports, 8 of the 10 men who attempted assassination of Malala Yousafzai in 2012 were acquitted in Pakistan.
In April 2015, officials in Pakistan said that 10 Taliban fighters had been found guilty and received 25-year jail terms.
However, only two of the men who stood trial were convicted, BBC reported.
The secrecy surrounding the trial, which was held behind closed doors, raised suspicions over its validity.
The Pakistani court claims that the two men convicted were those who shot Malala Yousafzai in 2012.
It was previously thought that both the gunmen and the man who ordered the attack had fled to Afghanistan.
Muneer Ahmed, a spokesman for the Pakistani High Commission in London, said on June 5 that the eight men were acquitted because of a lack of evidence.
Saleem Marwat, the district police chief in Swat, Pakistan, separately confirmed that only two men had been convicted.
Muneer Ahmed claimed that the original court judgment made it clear only two men had been convicted and blamed the confusion on misreporting.
Sayed Naeem, a public prosecutor in Swat, told the Associated Press news agency after the trial: “Each militant got 25 years in jail. It is life in prison for the 10 militants who were tried by an anti-terrorist court.”
In Pakistan, a life sentence is 25 years.
The acquittals emerged after reporters from the Daily Mirror attempted to locate the 10 convicted men in prisons in Pakistan.
The whereabouts of the eight acquitted men is not known.
The trial was held at a military facility rather than a court and was shrouded in secrecy, BBC reported. Anti-terrorism trials in Pakistan are not open to the public.
Pakistani authorities did not make the judgment available at any stage, nor did they correct the reports over the past two months that 10 men had been convicted.
The announcement of the convictions in April took many by surprise. No journalists had been made aware that the trial was taking place.
The Pakistani authorities did not say when and where the men had been arrested or how they were linked to the attack, or explain the charges against them.
Malala Yousafzai, who is now 17, was targeted by Taliban gunmen while she was travelling home from school in the town of Mingora.
The gunmen boarded a bus and asked for her by name before shooting her in the head.
She was targeted after campaigning for education rights for girls. She also wrote an anonymous blog for the BBC’s Urdu service, describing life under the Taliban
Malala Yousafzai was treated for her injuries in the UK and currently lives in Birmingham with her family. They are unable to return to Pakistan because of death threats from the Taliban.
A Taliban assault on an army-run school in the Pakistani city of Peshawar left at least 23 people dead and 40 others injured, officials say.
Five or six Talibans wearing security uniforms entered the school, officials said. Gunfire and explosions were heard as security forces surrounded the area.
The army says most of the school’s 500 students have been evacuated. It is not clear how many are being held hostage.
A Taliban spokesman says the assault is in response to army operations.
Hundreds of Taliban fighters are thought to have died in a recent military offensive in North Waziristan and the nearby Khyber area.
Photo Reuters
A school worker and a student interviewed by the local Geo TV station said the attackers had entered the Army Public School’s auditorium, where a military team was conducting first-aid training for students.
Ambulances have been carrying the injured to a nearby hospital. A helicopter is also in the area.
Mudassir Awan, a worker at the school, said he saw six or seven attackers.
“As soon as the firing started, we ran to our classrooms,” he said.
“They were entering every class and they were beating the children.”
The dead are said to include teachers, as well as a paramilitary soldier.
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Taliban militants have attacked Spozhmai Hotel outside Kabul in the Lake Qargha area, triggering a deadly gun battle with Afghan security forces and a hostage crisis.
Three guards and one police officer were killed, as were three militants, but two are still fighting, according to the chief of Kabul police.
An unknown number of people have been taken hostage, including women and children, but 18 have been freed.
The Taliban claimed the attack. Lake Qargha is on the outskirts of Kabul and is favored by residents of the Afghan capital for day trips and family outings.
The gunmen, armed with rocket-propelled grenades and heavy machine guns, launched the attack on the hotel late on Thursday, officials say.
Taliban militants have attacked Spozhmai Hotel outside Kabul in the Lake Qargha area, triggering a deadly gun battle with Afghan security forces and a hostage crisis
“Police forces have besieged the hotel where people gathered for a picnic or wedding party,” Kabul deputy police chief Daoud Amin told the AFP news agency.
“We will be very careful so that not to harm to civilians,” he added.
Some guests reportedly jumped out of hotel windows to flee from the attackers.
An unknown number remain inside.
The US-led coalition is providing support to the Afghan security forces, who are trying to flush out the insurgents from the hotel.
Reuters news agency quotes the Taliban as saying they attacked the hotel because wealthy Afghans and foreigners used it for “wild parties”.
Violence has recently increased across the country, with at least three US soldiers and about 20 Afghans killed in a series of attacks over the past seven days.
The attacks come as NATO prepares to hand responsibility to Afghan forces when the alliance’s combat troops leave in 2014.
