Malik Mumtaz Qadri, who killed Salman Taseer, Governor Punjab for urging reform of controversial blasphemy laws, on Thursday filed an appeal against his death sentence.

An Islamabad High Court (IHC) bench will on October 11, Tuesday, hear the appeal of Malik Mumtaz Qadri against the decision of an Anti Terrorism Court (ATC) that awarded him the death sentence on two counts with Rs0.2 million fine.

The Pakistani anti-terror court on Saturday found Malik Mumtaz Hussain Qadri, one of Punjab governor Salman Taseer's bodyguards, guilty of murder and sentenced him to death.

Qadri confessed to shooting Taseer dead outside an upmarket coffee shop close to his residence in the leafy capital Islamabad on January 4. He said he objected to the politician's calls to amend the blasphemy law, which mandates the death penalty for those convicted of defaming the Prophet Mohammed.

"Today we have filed an appeal in Islamabad high court against the verdict and have challenged Qadri's death sentence," Shuja-ur-Rehman, one of Qadri's lawyers, told AFP.

"The anti-terrorism court was not the competent authority to sentence him, this decision is illegal and baseless."

Rehman said a preliminary hearing for his appeal had been fixed for Tuesday.