On Thursday, police in Rawalpindi arrested senior leaders of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), including Leader of the Opposition in the National Assembly Umar Ayub.
Along with Ayub, other PTI leaders include Raja Basharat, Ahmed Chatta and Azeemuddin.
PTI lawyer Rana Mudassar told reporters that Ayub and Basharat were arrested by the policemen from the check post of Adiala Jail. He added that it was not clear what the charges were that led to the arrests of the PTI leaders.
The arrested leaders will be produced before the Anti-Terrorism Court (ATC) today as the party’s legal team challenged their detention.
The ATC issued instructions to the authorities concerned to present the PTI leaders at 7:30 pm today.
PTI lawyer Faisal Chaudhry said that 5 leaders of the party arrested by the police have been transferred to Police Lines Rawalpindi.
Rawalpindi police sources said this Geo News The police said that Ayub was arrested in separate cases registered in Attock, Hasan Abdal police stations.
He further said that Basharat and Chatha have also been arrested in some cases which the police have not identified while Raja Majid and Malik Azim were arrested in a case registered in Dhamial police station.
Moreover, the police submitted a report to ATC Rawalpindi after the arrests and decided to produce the PTI leaders in court on (tomorrow) Friday.
The development comes after the indictment of PTI founder Imran Khan along with 99 other accused in the General Headquarters (GHQ) attack case on May 9, 2023, sparked violent protests earlier today.
Ayub was among 100 accused in an anti-terror case in connection with attacks on military and government installations by activists and supporters following the arrest of the ousted prime minister by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) last year. There are allegations of incitement to
Ayub got bail in some cases including the GHQ attack and the D Chowk protest, however, this did not end his legal troubles as he was arrested after the party’s “final call” protest in Islamabad on November 24. Six new cases were registered under various charges. Last week there were fierce clashes between law enforcement agencies and PTI workers.
After that yesterday, the Special Anti-Terrorism Court (ATC) in Rawalpindi filed an acquittal petition against 120 people, including senior PTI leader Shah Mahmood Qureshi, in the GHQ attack case on behalf of the opposition leader. was excluded.
In the GHQ attack case, Ayub rejected the allegations against him, saying that there was no evidence of his presence at the crime scene, nor was he directly or indirectly related to the case.