Operation to disperse D-Chowk protesters will be initiated tomorrow: Nisar

The government does not want innocent lives to suffer, says interior minister in late night press conference

ISLAMABAD: Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar has said that in case the negotiations fail, the operation to disperse the Islamabad protesters will be initiated on Wednesday.

"If the negotiations fail until the next hour, the operation to clear D-Chowk will be initiated tomorrow,” Nisar said while addressing the media Tuesday night. “[the operation] will begin in front of you. I want the media to be there.”

Thousands of supporters of Mumtaz Qadri, who was executed last month for killing former Punjab governor Salmaan Taseer, are staging a sit-in outside parliament in the capital city to protest against his death penalty.

Nisar said that the government did not want innocent lives to suffer, and was trying hard to do away with violence.



“Some innocent people have been indoctrinated in the name of Prophet’s (pbuh) respect,” he said, adding he had ordered all troops to remain disarmed.

“There are eight elderly citizens, one is on a wheelchair. We are trying desperately to give them a safe passage but they wouldn’t agree.”

Nisar said he will go at any length to save every single innocent person from getting injured.

Earlier, the government once again intensified its effort to reach an agreement with the protesters after a two-hour ultimatum to disperse them from the Red Zone ended without yielding any result.

Islamabad’s commissioner, leader of Jamiat Ulema-e-Pakistan Anas Noorani and businessman Rafiq Pardesi reached D-Chowk to hold talks with the demonstrators, Express News reported.

According to sources, all preparations had already been carried out to launch an operation against those protesting in the Red Zone area, with heavy contingent of Pakistan Army, Frontier Corps and police on alert and awaiting orders.

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"An operation will be conducted if the participants of dharna (sit-in) do not disperse in a few hours," a security source told AFP on condition of anonymity.

"Leaders of the protesters have been given a notice in this regard," he said, adding that they had been given two hours to disperse.

If they do not, he said, "law enforcement agencies shall take action" by removing them.

A legal notice issued to the protesters and seen by AFP accused them of attempting "to frustrate the government's drive against terrorism".



Hundreds of protesters, who stormed the Red Zone on March 27, had converted their demonstration into a sit-in outside the Parliament House, refusing to budge from their position until their demands are met.

The government had called in army troops a day earlier after thousands of supporters of Qadri forced their way into the high-security zone and laid siege to important installations.

The protest, which initially began in Rawalpindi to mark 40 days of Qadri’s death, turned ugly after miscreants set fire to several vehicles on their way into the Red Zone.