Clashes Continue in Pakistan with Police Yet to Arrest Imran Khan

Lahore, March 15 (IANS) Protests broke out in major cities of Pakistan on Tuesday at the call of PTI Chairman Imran Khan as police and party workers continued to clash outside his Zaman Park residence in Lahore, media reports said.

Intermittent tear gas shelling is ongoing at Zaman Park as police which was previously camped out at a security barrier outside the neighbourhood has been forced to retreat towards Mall Road. PTI workers, meanwhile, have laid siege to the path leading to Imran Khan's residence as well as Canal Road, Dawn reported.

With police seeking Imran Khan's arrest, protests broke out in Islamabad, Peshawar, Karachi, and Rawalpindi after the PTI chief called on his supporters to "come out" following police's use of tear gas and water cannons on supporters outside Zaman Park.

Law enforcers and Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) workers clashed Tuesday as a heavy contingent of police reached Zaman Park to arrest the former Prime Minister in the Toshakana case the only case in which his arrest warrants are not suspended, Geo News reported.

In response, PTI workers have staged protests across major cities, including Karachi, Faisalabad, Sargodha, Vehari, Peshawar, Quetta, and Mianwali.

A team of Islamabad police has been in Lahore since Monday to comply with the court orders to arrest the PTI Chairman who faces a number of cases in different cities.

The riot police, although observing restraint, are using water canons and firing teargas to disperse the party's workers as they move ahead in their quest to arrest Khan, Geo News reported.

As the party's workers resorted to stone-pelting, 14 policemen including DIG Operations Islamabad Shahzad Bukhari sustained injuries. Meanwhile, the law enforcers have also arrested the PTI workers.

Imran Khan on Tuesday called on his supporters to "come out" as party workers and police officials clashed outside his Zaman Park residence in Lahore.

In a video message on Twitter, he said police had arrived to arrest him. "They think that after I am arrested, the nation will fall asleep. You have to prove them wrong."

"If something happens to me and I am sent to jail or if I am killed, you have to prove that you will struggle without Imran Khan and not accept the slavery of these thieves and of the one person who has been making decisions for the country," he said, Dawn reported.