Key Takeaways
- An anti-terrorism court in Islamabad rejected the police’s request for 30-day physical remand of PTI leader Khalid Khurshid.
- Khurshid was sent to judicial custody in connection with a case registered over the November 26 protest.
- The court also discharged PTI workers arrested in connection with two cases linked to the party’s recent long march.
An anti-terrorism court in Islamabad has rejected the police’s request for 30-day physical remand of PTI leader and former Gilgit-Baltistan chief minister Khalid Khurshid. The court directed that Khurshid be sent to judicial custody in connection with a case registered over the November 26 protest.
During the hearing, Islamabad police produced Khurshid before the court and sought his physical remand for 30 days. However, the court turned down the request, citing the need for judicial custody.
A case was registered against Khurshid, the president of the PTI’s GB chapter, at Aabpara Police Station in connection with the party’s November 26 protest in 2024. The protest saw more than 10,000 PTI protesters surge into Islamabad, defying a ban on public gatherings and a lockdown to skirmish with 20,000 security forces enlisted to turn them back.
The protest in the city’s Red Zone had ended in the PTI leadership’s hasty retreat, with the party announcing that it was calling off its planned protest sit-in “for the time being”. Subsequently, cases were registered against several PTI leaders under various sections of the Pakistan Penal Code and Section 7 of the Anti-Terrorism Act.
Khurshid was arrested along with Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly Speaker Babar Saleem Swati and several others at the speaker’s house in Peshawar, according to the PTI, shortly after the Centre imposed emergency and governor’s rule in KP on Oct 11. Sources said Khurshid had been staying at the KP chief minister’s residence since 2023 to avoid arrest by GB police.
In a separate development, the court also discharged PTI workers arrested in connection with two cases linked to the party’s recent long march after rejecting a request by the investigating officer for an adjournment to conduct their identification parade.
During proceedings concerning the PTI workers arrested in two cases registered at Shalimar and Secretariat police stations, the investigating officer requested an adjournment to conduct an identification parade. However, the defence counsel opposed the request, arguing that the workers had already spent more than 40 days in custody and that the police had repeatedly sought adjournments without producing them before the court.
The defence counsel maintained that the accused were innocent and had been deliberately implicated in the cases, alleging that the police arbitrarily arrested individuals and falsely portrayed them as PTI workers. The court ordered the discharge of all the PTI workers from the cases.
