LONDON, Feb 3: Former Sindh chief minister and provincial president of PML-N Syed Ghous Ali Shah has roundly condemned the threats hurled against retired generals and the media by a caretaker federal minister.

In a press statement issued here by the PML-N secretariat on Sunday, Mr Shah said that the government had already rendered impotent one of the pillars of the state by silencing the superior judiciary and also tried to hide its unsavoury deeds by imposing restrictions on the media and now once again by threatening the media it is trying to dissuade it from lifting the veil from the government’s plans to rig the forthcoming elections.

He said the re-arrest of Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry’s lawyers was a naked act of state terror. “By incarcerating the judges the government has created a constitutional crisis and now they are being stopped from taking part in social and religious activities and their families, including their children, are being denied free movement and access to outside world.”

He said by keeping the lawyers behind the bars without any rhyme or reason and using insulting language against retired generals the interim government which, according to him, supports the continuation of the martial law has lost its moral and legal authority to rule.

He said the PML-N will restore the superior judiciary after coming into power and tackle effectively the menace of inflation, unemployment, poverty, law and order situation and terrorism and take those who have looted the government treasury to the people’s court.