{"id":134,"date":"2014-11-18T13:14:06","date_gmt":"2014-11-18T13:14:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cpectrade.co.uk\/?p=134"},"modified":"2014-12-01T14:14:35","modified_gmt":"2014-12-01T14:14:35","slug":"court-issues","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cpectrade.co.uk\/?p=134","title":{"rendered":"court issues"},"content":{"rendered":"

Pakistan court issues arrest warrants for protest leaders Khan, Qadri
\n<\/strong>
\nPakistani opposition leaders reacted with outrage on Thursday after a court issued arrest warrants for a top politician and a firebrand cleric who led protests in the capital of Islamabad aiming to topple the government.<\/p>\n

An anti-terrorism court issued the arrest warrants for opposition leader and former cricketer Imran Khan and cleric Tahir ul-Qadri late on Wednesday. The warrants accused their supporters of storming parliament and the state television building on Sept 1.<\/p>\n

The warrants may provoke fresh unrest at a time when the country is struggling to rebuild its image.<\/p>\n

Thousands of protesters led by Khan and Qadri demanded the resignation of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif over allegations of corruption and vote-rigging in the May 2013 polls.<\/p>\n

The rallies turned deadly in September when demonstrators clashed with police in a central area near government buildings and embassies. Three people were killed.<\/p>\n

“I have just heard the good news about my arrest warrant,” Khan said, addressing protesters late on Wednesday. “It will be easy for me to live in jail … but I tell you, Nawaz Sharif, that you will have to pay a heavy price for my arrest.”<\/p>\n

The anti-terrorism court also issued warrants against 33 others for storming parliament and trying to take over the Pakistan Television building, taking it off air and beating up the station’s journalists.<\/p>\n

“The anti-terror court is meant for trial of terrorists, not politicians,” Khan’s spokesman, Shireen Mazari, said. “Imran Khan’s party will not allow police to arrest him.”<\/p>\n

Anti-terrorism courts are often used in Pakistan for non-terrorism related cases because they are faster and more efficient than regular courts.<\/p>\n

“This is a politically motivated, vengeful case against us,” Qadri’s party leader, Raheeq Abbasi, said. “The whole world knows that the PTV attack was a set-up.”<\/p>\n

The demonstrations came at a difficult time for Pakistan, already plagued by an Islamist insurgency, sectarian tension and recurrent power shortages, with many people deeply unhappy with the government’s performance since it came to power.<\/p>\n

Khan wants Sharif to step down because he believes the prime minister rigged the election. Sharif, who denies the charge, won the vote by a landslide, taking 190 of the 342 seats in the first democratic transfer of power in Pakistan’s history.<\/p>\n

The demonstrations in the capital eventually ended in late October after numbers shrank and Khan and Qadri said they would go on nationwide tours to drum up support.
\n
\nSource: Reuter<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Pakistan court issues arrest warrants for protest leaders Khan, Qadri Pakistani opposition leaders reacted with outrage on Thursday after a court issued arrest warrants for a top politician and a firebrand cleric who led protests in the capital of Islamabad aiming to topple the government. An anti-terrorism court issued the arrest warrants for opposition leader […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":135,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-134","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics","last_archivepost"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cpectrade.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/134","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cpectrade.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cpectrade.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cpectrade.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cpectrade.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=134"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cpectrade.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/134\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":136,"href":"https:\/\/cpectrade.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/134\/revisions\/136"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cpectrade.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/135"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cpectrade.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=134"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cpectrade.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=134"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cpectrade.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=134"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}