Islamabad: A special court in Islamabad extended Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf Vice Chairman Shah Mehmood Qureshi’s cypher case physical detention by three days on Friday.
The FIA requested a nine-day physical remand of the PTI leader. Its for further investigation into the cypher case involving the previous Imran Khan-led government’s alleged political use of classified documents.
Judge Abual Hasnat was hearing the case in camera in the special court. Which established under the Official Secrets Act and passed by parliament earlier this month over fierce resistance from politicians.
After his FIA arrest on August 20, Qureshi brought to the highly secured judicial complex by the Frontier Corps and Islamabad Police.
The PTI leader’s counsel, Shoaib Shaheen, disputed the FIA’s physical remand.
The judge remanded Qureshi to the FIA for three days, notwithstanding Zulfiqar Naqvi’s request for a nine-day remand.
PTI Chairman Imran Khan and his deputy Qureshi will face the Official Secrets Act cypher case trial in two weeks.
Official sources claimed the FIA is seeking to finish the challan by next week for trial in the newly constituted special court. Khan and Qureshi arrested by the FIA.
The agency has held the PTI vice chairman since August 19. A special court ordered him to FIA detention for four days till August 25.
Khan, however, caught in the same case while in Attock Prison for Toshakhana. The former premier told the JIT about losing the cipher’s cop after being probed at Attock Jail.
The JIT investigation concerns Imran’s diplomatic cypher, which apparently went missing and he had long used as evidence of a “foreign conspiracy” to fire him as prime minister.
