Complete bedlam in Imran Khan's Pakistan as govt bans radical outfit; lakhs on streets

Violent protests against the arrest of an Islamist party leader continued in Pakistan on Wednesday for the second day as demonstrators blocked roads in several major Pakistani cities, including the country's largest city of Karachi, Al Jazeera reported. Ever since the protests broke out, visuals, where scores of protestors were seen swarming the streets across all major cities, including Lahore and Rawalpindi, are making rounds on the Internet. One of the Twitter users said, "War-like situation in Pakistan", something that has been echoed by others too.

Pakistan bans Tehreek-i-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP)

Earlier on Wednesday, Pakistan Interior Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed had announced that the government has decided to ban the Islamist terror outfit Tehreek-i-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP). It was after this announcement that the workers and supporters of TLP have been carrying out violent protests across the country. 

As per Dawn, Pakistan's Sheikh Rashid Ahmed said that the religiopolitical terror outfit would be banned under Rue 11(b) of the Anti-Terrorism Act (ATA), 1997. Rashid had said that the Punjab government had recommended a ban on the organisation, for which a summary was being sent to the federal cabinet. He said TLP leaders used to come to all rounds of talks with the government after issuing instructions to their workers regarding road closures.

"They were more prepared than us but today we've decided that [a] ban on TLP [will be placed] and this file is going to the cabinet for the approval from today," the minister said.

This statement by Sheikh Rashid Ahmed came after the law enforcement agencies and officials moved to clear TLP activists from roads in different cities of Pakistan as violent protests refused to die down. Stating that the TLP workers through blocking roads had stopped ambulances from reaching their destinations and impeded the transport of oxygen cylinders of COVID-19 patients, the Pakistan Interior Minister called upon TLP members "who are running the media" to surrender. he also said that the TLP members were mistaken in their belief that they could create problems for the government through social media. 

"We want a document that exalts the flag of the Prophet (PBUH), but what you are demanding gives an impression of us being an extremist-minded state to the world," he told the TLP leadership.

Why are TLP supporters and workers protesting?

The TLP is protesting against the arrest of their leader Saad Hussain Rizvi, who was taken into custody earlier this week, and blasphemous caricatures of the Prophet published in France by Charlie Hebdo and others even recently and the controversy over French President Emmanuel Macron standing by the act. They have demanded that the Ambassador of France should be sent home and import of goods from that country banned, as reported by Dawn. According to media reports, the Imran Khan-led Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf government had signed an agreement with the TLP in November 2020, agreeing to expel the French Ambassador. The TLP had launched a massive protest in November last year against the cartoons but dispersed after the agreement with the government to expel the Ambassador by February and the deal was extended until April 20.

(Image: Twitter- @alam_mujaid, AP)