Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari slams Imran Khan over Pashtun leader Mohammad Ali Wazir's arrest

Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari condemned the arrest of Member of National Assembly (MNA) and Pashtun leader Mohammad Ali Wazir by stating that "it has been the modus operandi of the fascist governments to implicate the elected representatives in false cases to crush the public voice".

He said the arrest of Wazir was "against the democratic traditions". "It has been the modus operandi of the fascist governments to implicate the elected representatives in false cases to crush the public voice," Geo News quoted Bilawal as saying in a statement on Thursday.

Police arrested Ali Wazir in Islamabad on Wednesday in connection with a case registered against him and several leaders of the Pashtun Tahafuz Movement (PTM) in Karachi after a recent public meeting by the country`s opposition parties.

Bilawal said that holding public meetings is "no crime" and did not warrant arresting an elected representative, Geo News said. He warned the Imran Khan-led government that if it "continues to muzzle freedom of expression", it will "not bring good results", Geo News reported.

He also said in the statement that the cases being registered against the elected representatives and political leaders are "baseless".The PTM leaders were accused of committing several offences, including hatching a criminal conspiracy and passing derogatory remarks against state institutions, reported Dawn.

Peshawar Capital City Police Officer (CCPO) Mohammad Ali Gandapur said that Wazir was arrested at the request of the Sindh police. According to Dawn, witnesses said Wazir was arrested after he attended a ceremony held at Shuhada APS Public Library in connection with the sixth anniversary of the Army Public School attack, where 147 people were killed.

Several leaders of the PTM, who have also been charged in the case, were also present but were not arrested. Apart from Wazir, others named in the FIR include PTM chief Manzoor Pashteen and MNA Mohsin Dawar among others.

The complainant in the case claimed that when he reached the venue of the public meeting he saw the suspects addressing around 2,000 participants and trying to create hatred towards different groups and to create law and order problems, Dawn reported.

This comes as the rattled Imran Khan`s government registered a case against a central leader of the opposition`s 11-party alliance -- Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) -- for causing irreparable damage to a national asset at the rally in Lahore.