Gov’t accuses Shahbaz Gill, adviser to former Prime Minister Imran Khan, of inciting military mutiny in connection with comments aired on ARY TV.
A close aide of former Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan faces sedition charges over charges of inciting mutiny in the military, the interior minister said.
The charges were linked to comments by Khan’s adviser Shahbaz Gill and were broadcast on ARY TV Monday night in what Minister Rana Sanaullah described as a planned move to defame the military.
He said the defendant faces sedition charges of inciting mutiny in the military. “We deployed a special team to investigate it,” he told reporters in Islamabad on Wednesday, adding, “It was a planned move to slander our institutions.”
According to the accompanying police report, ARY owner Salman Iqbal, company vice president Ammad Yousaf and three other station employees are charged with “incitement”, “inciting mutiny” and “conspiracy”, AFP news agency reported.
The arrests came late Tuesday and early Wednesday, a day after a state media regulator said it had ordered ARY News to shut down for airing “false, hateful and inflammatory” content.
This is a kidnapping, not an arrest. Can such shameful acts take place in any democracy? Political workers treated as enemies. And all to get us to accept a foreign-backed crook government. pic.twitter.com/3NYS1BCjtf
— Imran Khan (@ImranKhanPTI) August 9, 2022
‘Kidnapping’
Khan said Gill was mistreated during his “kidnapping” and called for a fair trial. The charges are a conspiracy to turn his party against the military.
“If he has done something wrong, something that is illegal, charge him and give him a chance to defend himself in court,” he said in a recorded video statement broadcast by local TV stations.
He also tweeted: “This is a kidnapping, not an arrest. Can such shameful acts take place in any democracy? Political workers (are) treated as enemies. And all to make us accept (a) foreign-backed crook government.”
Gill said in the TV appearance that there were attempts to incite hatred against Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (Pakistan Movement for Justice, PTI) party in the middle and lower echelons of the military, who he said support the party loved.
He suggested that the younger ranks were being pressured by the top executives and that these orders went against the wishes of the majority and that the younger ranks should reconsider following orders that went against their principles.
Salman Iqbal tweeted that the comments were Gill’s personal opinion, with which his media house had nothing to do.
Both Khan’s party and the media house were considered pro-military until April when he was ousted in a vote of confidence by an opposition coalition.
ARY is a longtime supporter of Khan. The former prime minister has been critical of the military since leaving office.
Pakistan has been ruled by the military for about half of its 74-year history, and criticism of the country’s powerful security apparatus has long been seen as a red line.