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ISLAMABAD, May 11 (AP) — The Pakistani government has called in the army Wednesday in an area of deadly violence following the arrest of former Prime Minister Imran Khan, who was hauled from court on fresh corruption charges and ordered to He was held for another eight days, angering his supporters and deepening political turmoil in the country.
In an address to the nation, Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif said unrest by Khan’s supporters had “damaged sensitive public and private property” and forced him to deploy troops in the capital Islamabad, the most populous province of Punjab and restive regions in the Middle East. northwest.
Read also | Imran Khan arrested: Report says Pakistani army pre-planned arrest of ex-PM.
After Khan’s arrest on Tuesday, crowds in Islamabad and other major cities blocked roads, clashed with police and set fire to police checkpoints and military installations in violence that left six dead and hundreds arrested. Protesters stormed a radio station in the northwestern city of Peshawar on Wednesday.
“The people of Pakistan have never seen anything like this,” Sharif said after the cabinet meeting. “Even patients were taken out of ambulances and ambulances were set on fire.”
He called such attacks “inexcusable” and warned that those involved in the violence would be punished.
Sharif said Khan was arrested for involvement in corruption and there was evidence to support the charges.
Khan, who was ousted in a no-confidence vote in Sharif last year, is being held at a police compound in Islamabad. In a makeshift court there, a judge ordered the 70-year-old politician to be detained for at least eight more days, raising the prospect of more unrest.
The military also issued a strongly worded statement, vowing to take tough action against those who try to push Pakistan into a “civil war”. It called the organized attack on its facilities a “black chapter” in the country’s political history.
“What the country’s eternal enemy has been unable to do for 75 years, this power-hungry man in a political cloak has done,” the statement said. Attack at your own risk.
It said “severe action” would be taken against those who planned or participated in the attack on the military base. It did not name Khan directly in the statement.
Khan’s dramatic arrest on Tuesday — he was withdrawn from a hearing in Islamabad’s high court on one charge and then arrested on another — is the latest confrontation in turbulent Pakistan. He is the seventh former prime minister of the country to be arrested, also under the influence of the powerful military over the years. The move comes at a time of economic crisis, when cash-strapped countries are trying to avoid default.
Khan’s appearance in Islamabad comes amid multiple corruption charges brought by police. When he arrived, dozens of agents from the anticorruption agency National Accountability Office, backed by paramilitary forces, stormed the courtroom. After the Khan’s guards refused to open the door, they broke the window.
The former cricket star has denounced the case against him, which includes corruption and terrorism charges, as a politically motivated plot by his successor Sharif to prevent his return to power in elections due later this year .
Also on Wednesday, police arrested Fawad Chaudhry, Khan’s deputy and vice-chairman of Pakistan’s Jamadah al-Shaq party, outside the Islamabad Supreme Court. Choudhury, an outspoken critic of the government, insisted he had legal protection from arrest, and police did not specify the charges.
The party called for calm, but the country remained on high alert. The police were called out, and they placed the containers on the road leading to the sprawling police compound in Islamabad, where Khan was being held. Still, demonstrators stormed and burned the office of a senior police officer in charge of security at police facilities Wednesday night, including where Khan was being held.
Police officer Naeem Khan said his supporters in Peshawar attacked a building of Radio Pakistan, damaging equipment and setting it on fire. Some employees were trapped inside and police tried to restore order, he said.
In eastern Punjab province, the local government called on the military to intervene after authorities said 157 police officers were injured in clashes with protesters.
Police have arrested 945 Khan supporters in eastern Punjab alone since Tuesday, including two of the party’s top leaders, Asad Umar and Sarfraz Chima. Cheema).
Pakistan’s GEO TV aired video of Khan appearing before a judge at a police compound, showing him sitting on a chair and holding documents. He looks calm but tired.
In the new charges, Khan is accused of accepting properties worth millions of dollars in exchange for offering benefits to the real estate tycoon. The National Accountability Office requested that he be held for 14 days, but the court granted eight.
Khan was eventually indicted on Wednesday and pleaded not guilty in the original graft case in which he appeared in an Islamabad court on Tuesday. In that case, he faced multiple corruption charges from the Islamabad police.
Khan’s lawyers are challenging the arrest in Islamabad and are considering taking it to the country’s highest court.
The National Accountability Office has detained and investigated former officials, including former prime ministers, politicians and retired military officers. (Associated Press)
(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from a Syndicated News feed, the content body may not have been modified or edited by LatestLY staff)
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