Ultra-right-wing Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP) party banned
Pakistan government decided to ban the ultra-right-wing Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP) party whose supporters were involved in inciting and resorting to violence across the country for the past three days – under the country’s anti-terrorism law.
“Today we have decided to ban TLP and this file will go to the cabinet for approval,” said Interior Minister Sheikh Rasheed.
“It was our effort till the last moment to convince them to agree on a resolution but all of our efforts were unsuccessful,” he said. The religiopolitical outfit would be banned under Rule 11(b) of the Anti-Terrorism Act (ATA), 1997.
“We are banning them not for any political reason, but due to their character,” he said, adding that if the government met the TLP’s demands, it would send the world a signal that Pakistan was an “extremist state.”
The announcement came hours after law enforcement officials cleared the major roads and highways across the country after sporadic clashes between protesters and the police.
At least two police personnel lost their lives and 340 others were injured in the violent clashes, he said. TLP workers created hurdles in the way of ambulances and blocked highways and roads, disrupting the public life, paralyzing commercial activity in major cities.
Demonstrations erupted in several cities on April 12 and quickly turned violent after Saad Rizvi, the head of the TLP, was arrested ahead of planned protests. Before his arrest, TLP chief Rizvi had threatened the government with protests if it did not expel France’s envoy to Islamabad over depictions of the Prophet Muhammad in France.
Sheikh Rashid Ahmed said that no single political party can claim ownership to Namoos-e-Risalat as the matter was close to the hearts of the entire 200 million people of the country. Sheikh Rashid said the government remained committed to table a bill on Namoos-e-Risalat in the National Assembly.
Meanwhile, the banned terrorist organization Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) came out in support of the TLP protesters, congratulating them for putting up resistance against security forces.
“(We) pay them (the TLP) tribute for their courage and showing the military organizations their place,” the Taliban said in a statement. “We assure them that we will make them (the government) accountable for every drop of the martyrs’ blood,” they added, referring to TLP claims that its supporters had been killed in clashes with authorities.
TTP is behind some of the most gruesome terror attacks in Pakistan including the massacre at the Army Public School in Peshawar in 2014 which left at least 144 people, mostly children, dead.