Karachi, June 17: Pakistani prosecutors on Monday called for the death penalty for two Islamic militants as they concluded their arguments over a suicide car bomb blast which left 11 French engineers dead last year, court officials said. Judge Feroze Mahmood Bhatti presiding in an anti-terrorist court reserved his judgement until June 23, they said. The May 8 blast last year also killed two Pakistanis and the suicide bomber when the bomber drove an explosives-laden Volkswagen beetle into the French engineers' bus outside the Sheraton Hotel in Karachi. "The prosecution has proven the charges against the accused beyond any doubt... They should be awarded maximum deterrent punishment under anti-terrorism act, which is death," public prosecutor Maula Bux Bhatti told the court.
"This was the heinous offence which was condemned internationally. It was aimed at sabotaging the country's strategic project besides taking precious lives of innocent people," he said. Islamic militants Asif Zaheer and Mohammad Bashir were indicted by the court in April on charges of terrorism, use of explosives and conspiracy to murder. Both pleaded not guilty.

"The prosecution has miserably failed to establish any of the charges against my client," Zaheer's counsel M R Syed said.

Bureau Report