ISLAMABAD: A special court of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) in Islamabad on Wednesday issued perpetual arrest warrant for Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) leader Azam Khan Swati over his controversial posts on social media platform X (then known as Twitter) about senior military officers, including the then-army chief in October 2022.

Mr Swati was arrested in November last year for tweeting against the army leadership. He was later released on bail this year.

Special Judge, Central, Shahrukh Arjumand issued his perpetual arrest warrant.

The case against Mr Sw­­ati was registered under Section 20 of the Preve­n­t­ion of Electronic Crimes Act, 2016 which deals with offences against dignity of a person as well as Sec­tions 131 (abetting mutiny or attempting to seduce a soldier from his duty), 500 (defamation), 501 (defamation and printing of content deemed defamatory), Section 505 (statement conducing to public mischief) and 109 (abetment) of the Pakistan Penal Code.

Warrant for ‘self-exiled’ journalists

Also, an anti-terrorism court on Wednesday iss­ued perpetual arrest warrant for journalists Sabir Shakir and Moeed Pirzada in a case registered against them for allegedly inciting mutiny on May 9.

Published in Dawn, September 28th, 2023