LAHORE, May 11: About two dozen Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz workers were arrested on Friday near the Punjab Assembly.

The activists were commemorating the ‘forced expulsion’ of their party president Mian Shahbaz Sharif from the country on this day four years ago.

Mr Shahbaz Sharif was chucked out of the country to Saudi Arabia when he had landed at the Lahore airport.

The government says the Sharifs cannot return to Pakistan before completing 10 years in exile. They were banished to Saudi Arabia in December 2000.

PML-N workers raised slogans in favour of their party chief Mian Nawaz Sharif and chanted “Go Musharraf go”. They blocked traffic on The Mall and burned tyres there.

Police arrested almost all participants, except for a few who slipped from the venue. Those arrested, included Naushah Hameed, Nasir Khan Nasiri, Mian Waseem, Amjad Butt, Shahzadi Kabeer and Jamshed Farooqi.