ISLAMABAD: Asad Umar, a top aide of former prime minister Imran Khan, was arrested from the judicial complex in Islamabad on Wednesday after he arrived at the facility to submit a plea for access to Khan who is expected to face corruption charges in a heavy guarded police facility during the day.
Khan was arrested from the Islamabad High Court (IHC) by the paramilitary Rangers on Tuesday afternoon when he was about to give court appearance in two different cases. He was taken into custody on the instructions of the country’s anti-graft body, the National Accountability Bureau (NAB), in a third case, popularly known as the Al Qadir Trust reference, which relates to the purchase and transfer of land for a university in the Punjab province.
The top IHC judge declared his arrest “legal” after summoning senior police and capital territory administration officials and questioning them about the development.
Earlier in the day, Khan’s party colleagues and legal team said they were denied access to the ex-premier at the police facility ahead of the accountability court’s proceedings against him. They also vowed to lodge a complaint in the court before Umar’s arrest.
“Again an arrest under the court premises by this fascist regime,” Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party announced in a Twitter post after the recent arrest. “The Courts are not respected anymore in this country, democracy is completely suspended.”
The PTI urged its followers to come out and protest against the recent developments.
At the outset of the day, PTI vice chairman Shah Mahmood Qureshi went to the Police Lines Headquarter where Khan has been detained and where he is scheduled to face the corruption reference in front of the accountability court judge.
Qureshi and Umar are among the top most PTI leaders trying to determine the party’s strategy in the emerging political situation.
“I am demanding access to my [party] chairman,” Shah Mahmood Qureshi, who is currently leading the party in Khan’s absence. “I am demanding access of our legal team to have a meeting with Imran Khan. I have called a meeting at 2pm today at the party’s central office of the committee set up by Khan to oversee things in case he was arrested.”
A notification issued by the office of Islamabad’s chief commissioner on Tuesday announced Khan would not be taken to the F8 courts or the judicial complex in Islamabad for trial due to the security situation.
Riot police officers move to take positions at the vicinity of police headquarters, where Pakistan's former Prime Minister Imran Khan is held and will appear in a temporary court set up by authorities for security reasons, in Islamabad, Pakistan, Wednesday, May 10, 2023. (AFP)
Protest erupted across Pakistan following the arrest of Khan a day after the country’s military rebuked him for repeatedly accusing a senior intelligence officer of trying to engineer his assassination.
Some of Khan’s followers even stormed sensitive military installations and set public property on fire after his arrest, though PTI leaders tried to distance themselves from all the violence.
The top PTI leaders held a meeting in the federal capital which was presided over by Qureshi hours after the former prime minister was taken into custody.
“We are going to challenge the decision of Islamabad High Court in the Supreme Court of Pakistan [declaring Khan’s arrest as legal],” he said in a video message released after the meeting on Tuesday. “The senior [PTI] leadership will go to NAB court and meet with Imran Khan.”
Speaking about the violent protests in different parts of the country in the wake of Khan’s arrest, he said it was a “natural reaction” to the development.
“Workers are protesting and they should continue,” he said. “However, don’t take law into your hands. Stay peaceful. It is your legal and constitutional right to protest peacefully. Your demand for Imran Khan’s release is justified. This is a politically motivated case. And we will fight against it in a legal and political way.”
Pakistan authorities took the decision to shut down mobile Internet and suspended social media services to bring the situation under control.
However, some international rights organizations objected to how the government was dealing with the situation.
“Amid concerns about escalating clashes between Imran Khan’s supporters and the police, Amnesty International is alarmed by reports that Pakistani authorities have suspended mobile Internet and access to Twitter, Facebook and YouTube,” said UK-based organization in a Twitter post. “This restricts people’s access to information and freedom of expression. We call upon the Pakistan Telecommunications Authority and Interior Ministry to immediately reverse this ban.”
