Pakistani authorities on Friday deployed the army in the capital for two weeks as violent protesters who support jailed former prime minister Imran Khan clashed with police after they were blocked from entering the city.
The troops would guard Islamabad between October 5 and 17, an Interior Ministry notification said, as Pakistan prepared to host the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit later this month.
China’s prime minister, the deputy prime minister of Russia, India’s external affairs minister and several other leaders from South-East and Central Asia were expected to participate in the meeting of the prominent regional bloc.
The summit is a rare international event in Pakistan after almost two decades, a period during which the South Asian nuclear power has grappled with deadly violence orchestrated by Islamist militants.
“We will not let anyone spoil that,” Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi said as he visited the city with police chiefs.
Authorities deployed thousands of officers and paramilitary troops on Friday to seal the capital in order to block Khan’s supporters from entering the city.
They blocked all the entrance points into Islamabad with shipping containers, closed schools and suspended mobile and internet service, leaving the streets of the capital deserted, as Khan called for fresh protests to seek his release.
Khan’s supporters defied obstacles to push their way into the city, but police fired tear gas to disperse the protests.
Several protesters were arrested and more than a dozen officers were wounded as they were hit by stones thrown by Khan’s supporters, officials said.
More than 4,000 supporters, including hundreds of Afghan refugees, were arrested in overnight raids in the suburbs of Islamabad, a police spokesman told dpa.
Khan has been in prison for over a year after being convicted of several graft charges.
Most of his supporters were travelling to the capital from the north-western province of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, which is ruled by his party.
“We will fire back if police try to stop us from entering Islamabad,” warned Ali Amin Khan, chief minister of the province, before leaving for the capital at the head of the rally.
Experts said that by threatening police, Khan’s party was setting a dangerous precedent in a country that is already mired in violence by Islamist militants, Sunni sectarian groups targeting the Shiite minority and sub-nationalist rebels.
“It will be extremely threatening if a province takes up arms against the federal authorities,” said Fida Khan, a security analyst.
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