Imaan Mazari, husband sent on three-day physical remand in ‘security breach’ case

ISLAMABAD: An anti-terrorism court (ATC) on Tuesday approved a three-day physical remand of prominent lawyer and human rights activist Imaan Mazari and her husband, handing over the couple to the police in a case pertaining to alleged interference in government operations. The couple was presented before ATC Judge Abual Hasnat Zulqarnain today following their arrest by Islamabad police a day earlier in a case registered at Aabpara Police Station. The case pertains to an incident involving the duo’s scuffle with traffic police in the federal capital after they attempted to remove the road blockades placed for the visiting England team’s traffic protocol last week. The FIR includes Sections 186 (obstructing public servant in discharge of public functions), 148 (rioting, armed with a deadly weapon), 149 (every member of unlawful assembly guilty of the offence committed in prosecution of common object) and 353 (assault or criminal force to deter public servant from discharge of his duty) of the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC) along with Section 7 (punishment for acts of terrorism) of the Anti-Terrorism Act (ATA). Furthermore, the FIR filed on the complaint of Sub-Inspector Tanveer Athar, also includes PPC’s Sections 506(ii) (punishment for criminal intimidation) and 120B (punishment for criminal conspiracy). It states that a route was fixed for international teams’ — which enjoy the status of a state guest so as to protect them against any terror attacks — commute at Faisal Avenue when Imaan removed the barriers and provoked the people there. The suspect, it adds, called for the barrier to be removed and started shouting when another lawyer — her husband Abdul Hadi, — also arrived at the scene and started hurling threats towards the police. Imaan’s husband abused and slapped a policeman, reads the FIR. During the hearing today prosecutor Raja Naveed requested the court to grant 30-day remand of the suspects. Underscoring the significance of international teams’ visits, the official said that the police tried to stop the suspects who repeated their illegal actions and breached the security. Imaan and Hadi threatened the security of international teams, remarked the prosecutor while noting that two individuals accompanying the couple were also to be arrested. He also pointed out that it was necessary to have the video be forensically analysed. The court then approved a three-day physical remand of the suspects who were handed over to the police. The couple’s arrest, termed state fascism by Imaan’s mother and former minister Shireen Mazari, has been condemned by the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP).Lamenting their arrest on “vague charges of creating a security risk”, the HRCP said that both were “well-respected human rights defenders whose arbitrary arrest is symptomatic of the rapidly shrinking space for activists in Pakistan”.