After four days of protest, thousands of hardline Islamist protesters have begun to disperse from outside Pakistan’s parliament following last-minute negotiations with government intermediaries.
Among the concessions claimed by the demonstrators was a commitment not to amend the country’s controversial blasphemy laws, which human rights groups say are used to victimise religious minorities.
Although the country’s interior minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan insisted during a news conference that no deal had been done, a six-point agreement circulated on local media said the government had agreed to release “those engaged in peaceful protest” who had been arrested in the capital.
The demonstrators stormed into the capital on Sunday night, torching bus stations and clashing with police in a protest against last month’s execution of Mumtaz Qadri, the former police bodyguard who became a hero to clerics from the Barelvi school of thought after shooting dead his boss, Salmaan Taseer, the governor of Punjab province, in 2011.
Taseer had provoked the ire of the religious right by criticising the blasphemy laws and calling for a pardon to be given to Asia Bibi, a poor Christian woman sentenced to death despite flimsy evidence.
City authorities had claimed they were prepared to use force to clear an open space known as D-chowk near many of Islamabad’s most sensitive government buildings, including parliament and the prime minister’s office.
But government ultimatums repeatedly passed while discussions took place between protest leaders and ministers.
Mobile phone coverage was restored to the capital shortly before crowds finally began to disperse. Telecoms companies had been ordered to suspend their services for nearly four days in an effort to prevent the disorder spreading.
D-chowk has been the scene of several major protests in recent years, including by opposition politician Imran Khan in 2014 who camped out in the area as part of a failed bid to force the prime minister to resign.
No comments:
Post a Comment