ELECTION RIGGING.

ISLAMABAD  -  The Core Committee of Pakistan Teh­reek-e-Insaf (PTI) on Monday strongly condemned arrests of leaders and workers during “peaceful” protests of the party against alleged rigging in election results, besides announcing to celebrate Islamophobia Day on March 15 in the federal capital.

The Core Committee in its meeting stated that United Nations had desig­nated March 15 to mark International Day to combat Islamophobia in 2022 due to the struggle and efforts of PTI founder and former prime minister Imran Khan, The forum vehemently denounced the detention of PTI’s se­nior leaders and lawyers Latif Khosa and Salman Akram Raja by Punjab Police while “exercising their con­stitutional rights to peaceful protest against the polls fraud.” Meanwhile, PTI Secretary General Omar Ayub Khan addressing a press conference here said that Punjab Police detained a number of PTI workers during weekend’s protests against alleged rigging. He added that around 100 of them have been booked in various cases of serious nature including ter­rorism on the directives of Chief Min­ister Punjab Maryam Nawaz.

He demanded the Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Qazi Faez Esa to take notice of the situation. He vowed that they would exercise all options including judiciary, parliament and holding peaceful protests within the ambit of the law and constitution to get back the stolen seats from “man­date thieves.” He added that Islamabad police were also involved in the worst human rights violations. Omar claimed that the police would be held account­able for their alleged transgressions and human rights abuses, adding that the party would conduct an audit of their accounts by summoning them in the Public Accounts Committee, and the privileges, human rights or the in­terior committees of the parliament.

Similarly, he stated that the Khy­ber Pakhtunkhwa government would conduct an audit of the provincial police’s performance. “We will check their audit paras and performance; the abuses they committed against the people of PTI,” he added. About the IMF loan program, the PTI secre­tary general said that the “illegitimate and unconstitutional federal govern­ment” would waste the loan taken from the international lender saying it neither had the legitimacy, guts nor the moral power to take much-need­ed tough and correct decisions to ap­propriately utilize the money. Omar Ayub Khan on Monday called for res­toration of social media sites in the country. “They are blocking social me­dia even today. We demand that the social media sites should be restored,” the PTI leader said while speaking to media persons in Islamabad.