Pak bars JuD-linked party from elections

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s Election Commission on Wednesday barred the Milli Muslim League (MML), which is backed by the Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD), from contesting elections, a government official said.

Haroon Khan, a spokesman for the commission, said a fourman panel rejected the registration. Muhammad Raza Khan, chief of the commission, told MML’s lawyer at the final hearing of the registration that the new party has links with militant groups and as such “We can’t enlist you.”

The ECP spokesman said the commission cited an interior ministry recommendation that the MML was “affiliated” with Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), blamed for the 2008 Mumbai attacks that killed 166 people, and that such groups could breed violence and extremism in politics.

The US has designated LeT founder Hafiz Saeed a terrorist and offers a $10 million reward for information leading to his conviction.

Saeed, currently under house arrest, heads the JuD, which Washington says is a front for LeT.

Pakistan’s reluctance to press charges against him has been a sore point in relations with Washington and India over the past decade.

The party is likely to continue operating unofficially, as it did last month when one of its leaders contested a by-election in Lahore as an independent candidate.