Former Pakistani Prime Minister and jailed PTI chief Imran Khan.
Credit: Reuters File Photo
Islamabad: Pakistan police on Monday arrested jailed former prime minister Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s information secretary Rauf Hasan in a raid at the party’s central secretariat here, stepping up the crackdown on the Opposition party.
Initially, it was reported that PTI chairman Gohar Ali Khan was also arrested but Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) spokesperson Zulfi Bokhari rejected the report about Khan’s arrest while confirming that Hasan had been arrested.
It was not clear what are the charges against Hasan who was also attacked by unknown persons a few weeks ago that left bruises on his face.
The party also condemned the move through its official X account and lambasted the Islamabad police.
“It’s absolutely shameful how Islamabad Police continues to completely mock and disregard every law in this country,” the party said. “Law of the jungle is reigning over Pakistan!” PTI leader Khurram Sher Zaman claimed that police personnel were confiscating documents and equipment from the party’s office.
“We’ve been informed that they’ve locked staff in a room & waiting for [the] prison van to arrive & have taken computers & important documents,” he wrote on X.
Earlier, SSP Hassan Jahangir Wattoo led the raid as the police encircled the PTI headquarters in the federal capital.
The raid comes just days after PTI’s international media coordinator Ahmad Waqas Janjua was arrested on Friday.
According to Bokhari, he was presented before the Anti-Terrorism Court in Islamabad, which handed him over to police on a seven-day remand.
According to the charges, explosives were recovered from Janjua during his arrest and his links with banned organisations are to be investigated, police said in the court.