Authorities on Tuesday detained a senior member of a civil rights movement as he protested the detention of his group's leader one day earlier, a police official said. Mohsin Dawar, a sitting parliamentarian, was leading a demonstration in Islamabad of around 100 members of the Pashtun Protection Movement (PTM).
He along with around 25 of those with him "were taken into the custody", a spokesman for the Islamabad police, Zia Bajwa, told AFP. Amnesty International issued a statement calling for them to be freed. "Everyone has the right to freedom of peaceful assembly, as recognized in Pakistan's constitution and international law," the group's South Asia arm tweeted.
The PTM had been protesting the arrest of Manzoor Pashteen, the former veterinary student who now leads the protest movement. In videos posted on social media police can be seen apparently dragging Dawar into a van outside the Islamabad Press Club.
Dawar was also detained for months last year for allegedly inciting violent clashes with security forces during another protest. Pashteen's arrest was widely reported by international media on Monday, and both Amnesty and Human Rights Watch have issued statements calling for his release.
He is facing charges including sedition and incitement against the state's institutions. The Islamabad protest was one of several in major Pakistani cities Tuesday protesting his detention. In the Quetta around 3,000 supporters of PTM and other opposition parties demonstrated, while other smaller protests took place in Karachi as well as several cities in the northwest.
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