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US security team due for crucial talks

US security team due for crucial talks

LAHORE: The Sindh government has announced lifting of ban on Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaaf chairman Imran Khan’s entry in the province after Khan decided to move the Supreme Court against the restriction.

Sindh chief minister Qaim Ali Shah told the media here on Sunday that the ban was lifted on a direction of Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani.

It was for the fourth time in a couple of years that Khan was barred from entering Sindh. He was disallowed to board a Karachi-bound flight at the Lahore Airport on Sunday though the airport administration had issued him the boarding card.

The PTI chairman was due to lead a peace rally in Karachi, open his party’s membership drive as well as launch a fundraising for his Shaukat Khanum Cancer Research Hospital.

Talking to the media and latter speaking at a press conference, Khan asked the legality of the ban and announced challenging it in the Supreme Court as well as taking some route, like leading a rally by road, to reach Karachi.

Alleging that the Muttahida Qaumi Movement was behind the restriction to force him to withdraw his case against MQM leader Altaf Husain filed in UK, he pledged never to bow before the pressure and would take the case to its logical conclusion. The PTI Chairman said that the government is trying to protect Altaf Hussain and the May 12 Karachi carnage case.

He said the MQM chief could have been arrested provided the Pakistan government allowed the Scotland Yard police to probe the case in Karachi.

Regretted that a British nationality holder, Altaf Husain, was running a political outfit in Pakistan while sitting in London for the last 18 years, he said mafias and not political parties are run like this.

He said the MQM chief talked of writ of government in Swat but was silent on killings in Karachi which, as he said, were being blamed on the MQM by the Sindh inspector-general and Karachi capital city police officer.

‘We’re trying to forge unity among all ethnic groups but Altaf Hussein considers Karachi his property and stopped us,’ Khan said.

Referring to an MQM leader’s statement that being a Pukhtoon, Imran Khan was a supporter of Taliban, the PTI leader said he and his party had never done politics on the basis of prejudices. He said he had warned of the possibilities of Pukhtoon’s reaction much before the army operation was launched in the tribal areas in 2004.