Lahore: As PTI supporters continued to stand guard outside party chairman Imran Khan’s home, the Lahore High Court extended the ban on police action at Zaman Park until 3 p.m. today.
Imran has been avoiding arrest in the Toshakhana case. He is still in his Zaman Park home with hundreds of supporters. PTI supporters have been in “pitched battles” with the police and Rangers over the past few days.
The Islamabad police, along with Punjab Police and the Rangers, went to the ex-prime minister’s home on Tuesday. They went there to carry out the non-bailable arrest warrants. Said warrants were issued by an Islamabad sessions court in the Toshakhana case, where he has missed several hearings.
The operationwas heldd off because of the LHC order.
The PTI leader Fawad Chaudhry asked the LHC to hear his petition about the police operation outside Imran’s home.
Two times before, the court stopped the police operation outside of Imran’s home and told the Punjab police and PTI to sit down and talk about how to solve the problem.
Before today’s hearing, Chaudhry tweeted that both sides had “agreed to solve the problems,” and that the agreed-upon solution would be shown in court today.
As the hearing started, Chaudhry told the judge, “You have saved Pakistan and Lahore in the last two days.”
“Your help has saved people’s lives,” he said.
The leader of the PTI said that a group from his party met with the head of the Punjab police and the chief secretary to talk about Imran Khan’s safety.
Chaudhry said that the Punjab government had told the delegation that the PTI chief would have the right amount of security. He also told the court that the PTI’s public meeting at the Minar-e-Pakistan will now happen on Monday.
He also told the court that they made a request for bail protection for the party leader.
The judge then said that there were two different things going on. “One of them is being heard in the Islamabad High Court, and the other is in a trial court,” he said, asking how his court could hear the matter.
The judge said that people who do “injustice,” no matter who they are, should be punished according to the law. “We have cameras everywhere, so it’s easy to find the faces of people who do wrong,” Justice Sheikh said.
The lawyer for the PTI told the judge, “We want our client to come to you to have his plea heard.”
The provincial police chief told the court that the PTI had agreed to name a point person. The police also told the meeting that no area could be a no-go zone.
The advocate general of Punjab told the judge that the police couldn’t get into Zaman Park to do their jobs.
Chaudhry said that the police were trying to get permission to make arrests. He said, “They [law enforcement] have filed one FIR against 2,500 people.”
He then asked the head of the police to let the court know why the warrant against Sanaullah hadn’t been carried out. The barrister gave the court his word that his client would show up in court.
The IGP asked again if he could go to Zaman Park.
“How do you plan to make them happy?” Justice Sheikh asked the IG and then told everyone involved to sit down and figure out what to do.
After hearing the arguments, Justice Sheikh adjourned the hearing till 3 p.m. Because of this, the police couldn’t do anything in Zaman Park for another three hours.
