Authorities searching for ‘wanted’ people: Imran

F.P. Report
LAHORE: Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan said Friday that, unlike the authorities’ earlier claim, they were not looking for terrorists but only people who were “wanted” at his Zaman Park residence in Lahore.
“Now, they are claiming that they are hunting down wanted people and not terrorists,” Khan told journalists at his residence after meeting a government delegation that came to his house for mulling over the SOPs for a search operation. “If they want to search for wanted men, then they already have them. They have arrested 7,500 of our ‘wanted’ workers,” Khan said, claiming that anyone associated with his party was a “wanted person” right now.
“I told them: come inside and look for yourself, there’s no wanted person here.” In his presser, Khan asked the authorities if they wanted to look for terrorists, then why were they insistent on searching his house. “Why would you want to search my house? But, if you want to, I will only allow it if they agree to follow Lahore High Court’s earlier order of three people — one government personnel, one person from our side, and a lady officer — searching the house.” Khan said he feared that if the police personnel, with a heavy contingent, come to raid his house, then they might “plant people or material” at his house “like they did earlier”.
Following Khan’s arrest on May 9 in the Al-Qadir Trust case, his party workers upped the stakes and attacked military installations, including the General Headquarters in Rawalpindi. But Khan has repeatedly denied responsibility and said his party had no role in the violence. “We have repeatedly condemned May 9 attacks,” Khan said, clarifying that he has not only condemned the attack on the Lahore Corps Commander House, but every violent incident.
The former prime minister proposed that if the authorities provide evidence that his party workers were involved in the arson attacks, PTI would help arrest them. “Under the guise of their crackdown, they are trying to wipe out the party,” he said, adding: “But I will play till the last ball.”
Earlier, the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) has refused to allow a police party to conduct a search operation of party chairman Imran Khan’s Zaman Park residence in the provincial capital as the authorities seek to detain “terrorists” present inside his house.
The Punjab government Wednesday claimed that “30-40 terrorists were hiding inside Khan’s residence” and gave 24 hours to PTI to hand over these miscreants or face action — but even after the passage of 48 hours, no action has been taken. The government’s negotiation team — after securing search warrants from an anti-terrorism court — was at Zaman Park for more than an hour and discussed the SOPs with the PTI chief and his legal team, but they could not make headway.
Khan, according to people privy to the meetings, has put forth some of his conditions for the search, and the delegation will present them before the interim government. The authorities also presented the “evidence” before the PTI chief about the terrorists’ — who attacked smashed and set ablaze military installations — presence inside his residence, but he did not budge.
The authorities have begun a crackdown on PTI workers and leaders after they torched public property and defence installations following the arrest of Khan on May 9, which the army dubbed as “Balck Day”.