LONDON, Sept 15: A group of around 50 Pakistanis and Britons of Pakistan origin demonstrated for two hours here on Saturday near the Saudi embassy against what they called Riyadh’s

involvement in the deportation of former prime minister Nawaz Sharif.

Organised by Pakistani students studying at various institutions in the UK, the protesters were joined in by lawyers and other professionals. They submitted a memorandum calling for a “formal apology” from the Saudi government to the people of Pakistan’ for ‘the insult’ caused to the Pakistani nation and their Supreme Court, and asked Riyadh to allow Mr Sharif to return to Pakistan.

This was said to be the first ever such protest against the Saudi embassy in the UK and as a precautionary measure, the embassy reportedly shut its visa office for the day.

Earlier, when the protest was first mooted among students and professionals of Pakistani origin, an e-mail debate had raged on how much Mr Nawaz was himself responsible for Saudi interference in the country’s domestic politics among scores of Pakistanis even as they prepared for the event. Some had taken the position that the deportation had taken place at the initiative of Saudi Arabia.

Some of those who insisted that more than the Saudis, it were

the Americans who had orchestrated the entire drama had referred to an article of General Anthony C. Zinni (Commander of

US Centcom in October 1999) published in Washington Post interestingly on the very day (Sept 9) Mr Nawaz had chosen to fly back home.

In the article, Gen Zinni had disclosed that in December 1999 and later that is much before 9/11 Gen Musharraf at his (Zinni’s) request had done at least five major favours to the US, mostly in Washington’s campaign against Al Qaeda.