Police entered Imran’s house, 20 party workers arrested

Lahore: Police in Pakistan’s Punjab province entered the house of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) chairman and former prime minister Imran Khan on Saturday using force and arrested over 20 party workers. Mr. Khan was on his way to a court in Islamabad for a hearing in the Toshakhana case at the time of the action.

Significantly, Mr. Khan is to be produced in the court on the basis of a warrant in a case. The Punjab Police’s recent attempt to arrest Mr. Khan led to clashes between police and party workers. According to TV news channel Geo News, the police have launched the operation to clear the worker camps set up by the party at Mr. Khan’s Zaman Park residence.

“Section 144 has been imposed, all of you are requested to leave,” the police said before entering Mr. Khan’s house. According to Geo News, the police entered the house by bulldozing the main gate and detaining several PTI workers. The police also claimed to have faced direct gunfire and petrol bombs from inside Mr Khan’s residence in response to their action.

A heavy contingent of police was deployed in the area after the administration and PTI reached an agreement on Friday regarding searches at Zaman Park. The police also recovered material used to make Molotov cocktails during the search operation. Meanwhile, Mr Khan tweeted that the police acted at a time when his wife Bushra Begum was alone at home.

Mr Khan tweeted, “Punjab Police has raided my house in Zaman Park, where Bushra Begum is alone. Under which law are they doing this? This is part of the ‘London Plan’, where fugitive Nawaz Sharif was committed to power in return for agreeing to an appointment. According to some reports, the former prime minister was on his way to Islamabad at the time of the police action. He released the video on Twitter saying that he was late in reaching the court due to a road accident on the way.