US ‘concerned’ as Pakistan activist says father detained
WASHINGTON: Washington said it was “concerned” by reports that the father of a Pakistani activist who fled the country has himself been detained, the latest incident to fuel fears of a clampdown on dissent.
Alice Wells, assistant secretary of state for South and Central Asia, tweeted her concern over “reports of the continued harassment of Gulalai Ismail’s family, and her father’s detention today”.
She said the US called on Pakistan to “uphold citizens’ rights to peaceful assembly, expression, and due process”.
Wells tweeted after Ismail - a women’s rights activist who fled to the US and is seeking asylum - said her father Mohammad
Ismail had been taken away by unknown men earlier on Thursday outside a court in Peshawar, a western city near the border with Afghanistan.
LAHORE COURT GRANTS BAIL TO AILING SHARIF LAHORE: A top Pakistani court on Friday granted bail to jailed former prime minister Nawaz Sharif who was undergoing treatment after being diagnosed with an acute immune disorder.
The 69-year-old Pakistan Muslim League-nawaz (PML-N) supremo was rushed to the Services Hospital in Lahore from the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) office late on Monday night after a massive drop in his platelet count.
A two-member bench of the Lahore High Court heard the petition of PML-N president Shahbaz Sharif seeking the release of his elder brother from the custody of the NAB on medical grounds in the money laundering case and accepted it.