ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s former prime minister Nawaz Sharif will not return to the country before completing medical treatment in London, a senior leader of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) said on Saturday, though the government and a local court seek the ex-premier’s extradition after his medical bail recently expired.
The ex-premier and opposition leader was granted eight weeks of medical bail in November last year for treatment in London. The Islamabad High Court allowed him to request an extension from the provincial government of Punjab, but the latter said in February that the PML-N leader had insufficient legal, moral or medical grounds to stay away from the country.
“Everybody knows that Nawaz Sharif is undergoing a medical treatment in London for multiple diseases and will return to Pakistan after full recovery,” Senator Mushahidullah Khan, Sharif’s a close aide and a senior PML-N leader, told Arab News.
Sharif was sentenced to seven years in jail for corruption in December 2018. He denies any wrongdoing and has termed all charges against him as politically motivated. However, the Islamabad High Court issued non-bailable arrest warrants for him on September 15 due to his failure to return to Pakistan and face corruption cases against him.
“Our party strongly believes in the rule of law and respects the judiciary, but we aren’t ready to put Nawaz Sharif’s life at risk by advising him to return to Pakistan at this time,” Khan said. “Nawaz Sharif is getting treatment in London by exercising one of the basic human rights — the right to medical treatment.”
The three-time former premier urged opposition parties last month while addressing a multiparty conference to formulate a strategy to overthrow Prime Minister Imran Khan’s government for being “inefficient.”
However, he also maintained that the real target of the opposition’s confrontational politics was not going to be the current Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) administration but those who had brought it into power.
Sharif’s reference to the country’s security establishment became clear from his subsequent statements wherein he accused Pakistan’s military of interfering in political matters. After his recent fiery speeches from London, the government slapped a broadcast ban on “proclaimed offenders and absconders,” a prohibition that was widely viewed as an effort to silence Sharif.
Prime Minister Khan also asked PTI leaders to respond to the opposition’s narrative on Friday and instructed them to devise legal strategy to bring back the PML-N leader to the country from the UK.
“The government has decided in principle to use all legal and diplomatic options to ensure Nawaz Sharif’s extradition from UK,” PTI spokesman Ahmad Jawad told Arab News.
Legal experts say, however, that the possibility of Sharif’s deportation from the UK is limited in the absence of an extradition treaty between the two countries.
“We know it’s difficult to bring a criminal back from the UK in absence of the extradition treaty, but it doesn’t mean that we stop initiating the process. The government has initiated the process for Nawaz Sharif’s repatriation on directions of the Islamabad High Court, and we hope the UK authorities will respond positively,” Jawad said.
Muzzammil Mukhtar, a solicitor and director of London law firm, Synthesis Chambers Solicitors, said that there was a public perception that miscarriage of justice could occur in Pakistan in such political cases, adding that the extradition of a politician like Nawaz Sharif was therefore a complex process.
“Even if Pakistan seeks his administrative removal from the UK on the basis of visa and bail expiry, Sharif has an absolute right to claim protection in London under local laws,” he told Arab News.
Mukhtar said that the UK government could not extradite or even deport a person until all rights to appeal and relief of an applicant were not exhausted.
“Nawaz Sharif can seek to stay in London under Article 2 and 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights,” he said. “A person’s right to life and protection, based on medical conditions, is covered under these articles.”
Nawaz Sharif won’t return to Pakistan anytime soon, close aide says
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Nawaz Sharif won’t return to Pakistan anytime soon, close aide says
- Sharif’s party PML-N says it does not want to risk his life by advising him to return to Pakistan without finishing his medical treatment
- Legal experts describe Sharif’s removal from the UK as a complex process, say the ex-premier can even demand protection in London under local laws
Pakistan calls for calm after 16 people killed in Khamenei protests
- The violence came hours after Iranian authorities confirmed Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei was killed in coordinated US-Israeli strikes
- Nine people were killed in clashes in Karachi where protesters stormed US consulate, while UN offices were set ablaze in Gilgit, Skardu
ISLAMABAD/KARACHI/GILGIT/PESHAWAR: Pakistan’s Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi on Sunday urged calm after at least 16 people were killed in protests linked to the killing of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in joint US-Israeli strikes.
Hundreds of protesters gathered outside the US consulate in Karachi on Sunday morning. Videos showed protesters armed with sticks smashing doors and windows. Separate footage appeared to show property inside the consulate premises set on fire, prompting police to fire tear gas at them.
In Islamabad, protesters entered the Red Zone which houses key government and diplomatic offices in the capital, prompting authorities to fire tear gas to disperse the demonstrators. Similarly, people gathered outside the press club in the northwestern city of Peshawar, from where they were marching toward the US consulate.
At least nine people were killed and 60 others sustained injuries in clashes with law enforcement outside the US consulate in Karachi, according to authorities. Seven more were killed in the northern Gilgit-Baltistan region, where clashes left 45 people injured.
“After the martyrdom of Ayatollah Khamenei, every citizen of Pakistan is saddened in the same way as the citizens of Iran are grieving,” Naqvi was quoted as saying by his ministry.
“We are all with you. We request the citizens not to take the law into their hands, and to record their protest peacefully.”
Naqvi visited different areas of Islamabad and reviewed the law-and-order situation, according to the interior ministry. He ordered foolproof security arrangements at the Diplomatic Enclave, which is home to foreign missions, in Islamabad’s Red Zone.
PROTESTERS STORM US CONSULATE IN KARACHI
Additional Inspector General Karachi Azad Khan told reporters that protesters had managed to enter the US consulate from the outer gate before police dispersed them.
“Nine people are dead while 39 injured are being treated at the Shaheed Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto Institute of Trauma,” Karachi Police surgeon Dr. Summaiya Syed said in a statement.
She said seven others were injured at the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Center, among them five police personnel, while 14 others were receiving treatment for wounds at private hospitals in the city.
Separately, the Sindh provincial government expressed grief at the loss of lives in the clashes outside the US consulate in Karachi, saying it had constituted a high-level joint investigation committee (JIT) to carry out an impartial investigation into the incident.
“The JIT will determine the circumstances in which the incident occurred and what its causes were,” a statement by the provincial government said, adding that it respects the constitutional right of citizens to protest.
VIOLENCE IN GILGIT-BALTISTAN
In GB, protesters set fire to and vandalized several buildings, including United Nations (UN) regional offices, according to Shabbir Mir, who speaks for the GB chief minister. Religious leaders were trying to quell the protests.
“Seven people were killed and 45 were injured in today’s clashes in Gilgit,” Dr. Wajahat Hussain, a senior health official in Gilgit, told Arab News on Sunday.
Tufail Mir, a deputy inspector-general of police, told Arab News several people were injured in the Skardu district as well.
MIDDLE EAST TENSIONS
The violence came hours after Iranian authorities confirmed Khamenei was killed in coordinated strikes carried out by the US and Israel, dramatically escalating tensions in the Middle East and triggering protests in several countries.
According to US officials, the operation targeted Revolutionary Guard command facilities, air defense systems, missile and drone launch sites, and military airfields. The US military said it suffered no casualties and reported minimal damage to its bases despite what it described as “hundreds of Iranian missile and drone attacks.”
Iran retaliated by launching missiles and drones toward Israel and targeting US military installations in Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar and the UAE. The Emirati government said its air defense systems intercepted dozens of Iranian missiles and drones, but debris from the interceptions caused material damage in Abu Dhabi and Dubai, and at least one civilian, a Pakistani national, was killed. It issued rare emergency alerts urging residents to seek shelter, underscoring how the conflict has rippled far beyond Iran’s borders.
The Israeli military said dozens of Iranian missiles were fired toward Israeli territory, many of which were intercepted. Israel’s Magen David Adom rescue service said a woman in the Tel Aviv area died after being wounded in a missile strike.
