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Ahead of Imran Khan's arrest, his supporters clash with police in Pakistan

Published : Tuesday, 14 March, 2023 at 8:47 PM  Count : 765

Riot police use water cannon to push back supporters of former prime minister Imran Khan gathered outside Khan's house to prevent officers from arresting him, in Lahore on March 14, 2023. PHOTO: AFP

Riot police use water cannon to push back supporters of former prime minister Imran Khan gathered outside Khan's house to prevent officers from arresting him, in Lahore on March 14, 2023. PHOTO: AFP


Pakistani police and supporters of Imran Khan fought pitched battles on Tuesday outside the former prime minister's home in the eastern city of Lahore, injuring several on both sides, ahead of his possible arrest, a government spokesman and witnesses said, report agencies.

The police charged the supporters with batons and lobbed teargas shells.
A few hundred Khan supporters gathered outside his house after a police team arrived from Islamabad to arrest him on a court order, government spokesman Amir Mir told Reuters.

Khan's Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) workers started the violence, which injured several police officials, Mir said, adding, "If Imran Khan ensures his presence in the court, it will be good, otherwise the law will take its course." Khan called on his supporters to stand up for the supremacy of law and fight for true independence.

"Police have come to arrest and send me to jail," he said in a video recorded statement posted by his twitter handle. "If something happens to me, or sent to jail, or they kill me, you've to prove that this nation will continue to struggle even without Imran Khan." Mir said the government has called out paramilitary forces to control the situation.

Several of Khan's supporters were injured when the police resorted to teargas shelling, witnesses said.

Police fired tear gas at the house as Khan's supporters hurled rocks and bricks at the officers. About a dozen police and some 35 of Khan's supporters were reported injured. Tear gas shells and pieces of bricks littered the pavement as Khan's followers fought back with batons snatched from the officers.

Khan has been ordered to appear before a judge in Islamabad on Friday to answer charges of illegally selling state gifts he had received during his term as premier and concealing assets.
Police official injured

Khan, who was ousted in a no-confidence vote in Parliament last April, has claimed that the string of cases against him, which include terrorism charges, are a plot by the government of his successor, Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif, to discredit the former cricket star turned Islamist politician.

"We will arrest him, and will do it on a court order," Shahzad Bukhari, deputy-inspector general of Islamabad police, told reporters earlier in Lahore. Bukhari was later also lightly injured in the violence and received first aid from police medics at the scene.

Similar clashes took places last week. "We have come here just for the compliance of the court order," deputy inspector general of police Syed Shahzad Nadeem told reporters.

The court in Islamabad had issued the arrest warrant in a case against Khan for unlawfully selling state gifts while in power from 2018 to 2022, his aide Fawad Chaudhry told Reuters.

END/SZA






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