Pakistani minister shot and injured

PAKISTAN’S interior minister was recovering in hospital yesterday after being shot in a suspected assassination attempt possibly linked to blasphemy, with the attack seen as an ominous sign for security ahead of nationwide elections.

Ahsan Iqbal, 59, was shot in the right arm as he left a public meeting in his constituency in Punjab province late on Sunday.

A man identified by police only as “Abid” and said to be in his early 20s was wrestled to the ground by officers and bystanders as he was preparing to fire a second shot.

He has been taken into custody. Police are still investigating the attack, but local deputy commissioner Ali Anan Qamar said the shooter was motivated by a controversy last year in which a small amendment to the oath that election candidates must swear had to be hastily reversed after it was linked to blasphemy.

The row sparked a three-week sit-in last November by a previously little-known Islamist group, which paralysed the capital.

That demonstration ended when the government capitulated to the protesters’ demands – including the ousting of the federal law minister – in a deal brokered by the military.

At the time, many Pakistanis and analysts warned that a dangerous precedent had been set in which fringe groups could bend the state to their will by citing blasphemy, a highly inflammatory charge in the conservative Muslim country.

Iqbal, a champion of Pakistan’s much-persecuted religious minorities, had pushed for a negotiated settlement to the controversy. He has previously condemned hate speech against groups such as the Ahmadis, an Islamic minority sect who were at the centre of the dispute.

After the shooting, he was rushed first to a local hospital and then airlifted to Lahore, where video footage released by his ruling Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz party (PMLN) showed him being lowered from a helicopter on a stretcher.

The attack was swiftly condemned by the international community as Pakistanis voiced fears it represented an attempt to weaken democracy ahead of the federal elections, widely expected to be held late this summer.

The vote will only be Pakistan’s secondever democratic transition, and with the PML-N in disarray since Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif was ousted by the supreme court over graft allegations last summer, there has been growing speculation it could be delayed.

Sharif and his supporters claim they are victims of a conspiracy driven by Pakistan’s military to reduce the sway of their party.

Blasphemy can be punishable by death under controversial Pakistani legislation, with even unproven allegations sparking mob lynchings and murders.