Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: Attorney General (AG) Ashtar Ausaf Ali informed the Supreme Court on Friday that an anti-riot law was being drafted by the federal government to deal with the protesters in accordance with the law.

A two-member Supreme Court bench comprising Justice Mushir Alam and Justice Mazhar Alam Khan Miankhel, was hearing a suo-motu case pertaining to a sit-in by a religious party, Tehreek-e-Labbaik Ya Rasool Allah (TLY), at Faizabad interchange in Nov 2017, which kept the lives of citizens paralyzed for almost 23 days.

The AG stated that an anti-riot law would soon be approved by parliament. During the hearing, the court expressed dissatisfaction over the reports submitted by the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and Islamabad Police pertaining to characters and motives behind the Faizabad sit-in.

In the last hearing, the court had expressed dissatisfaction over the reports submitted by the ISI and Islamabad Police on the sit-in and sought fresh reports, which too were termed unsatisfactory on Friday.

Justice Mushir Alam noted, “The protesters set off for Islamabad from Lahore, but no one bothered to stop them there. Nor did anyone stop them at the Liaquat Bagh where they had camped out en route Islamabad.”

The court asked the attorney general to explain as to what action was taken against the person who was leading the protest. The AG then stated that TLY was a registered political party. To a court query, AG said 418 protesters were arrested. The court directed the AG to submit a detailed report on the matter within two weeks.

During the weeks-long protest that had virtually paralysed the capital, the government and TLY leaders reached an agreement on November 26, 2017, in which the government accepted the demands of TLY leaders, including dropping all the cases against the protesters and their leaders.

After the agreement reached between the government and Faizabad protest leaders, the Islamabad High Court (IHC) had also questioned the legal standing of the agreement, saying that none of the terms could be legally justified. The court had also questioned that how the cases filed under the Terrorism Act could be quashed.

Published in Daily Times, February 17^th 2018.