Islamabad, July 29: A Pakistani court has extended the physical remand of a close aide of jailed former prime minister Imran Khan’s party for two more days and sent a female social media activist, allegedly linked to the political organisation, to judicial remand.
The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) presented Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s (PTI) Central Information Secretary Raoof Hasan before Dis¬trict and Sessions Judge Judge Murid Abbas on Sunday after the expiry of his three-day remand granted last week, the Dawn newspaper reported on Monday.
The FIA prosecutor informed the judge that the case record, including transcripts of videos, has been submitted to court. The forensic analysis of the videos has to be carried out, the prosecutor said and sought eight days’ physical remand of Hasan.
Following the arguments, the judge extended Hasan’s physical remand for two more days, the report said.
During the last hearing on Thursday, the FIA presented a report to the court claiming that Hasan received “instructions through messages, audio notes, graphics and videos” from abroad daily. It alleged that the PTI member oversees the party’s social media teams that run trends on social media platforms “to incite violence, create law and order situation and fan cyberterrorism”.
The FIA also presented Syeda Arooba Kanwal, a social media activist who was allegedly linked with the PTI in court.
The FIA prosecutor claimed that Kanwal was operating the party’s account on social media platform X, which she refused to surrender to the investigators, and sought her physical remand for investigation.
The defendant’s lawyer, Ali Bukhari, said Kanwal was an employee and handled PTI’s social media account. He claimed the entire case has been based on data retrieved from a cell phone, which is already in FIA’s custody. The advocate requested the court to discharge all the accused.
However, the judge sent Kanwal to jail on judicial remand.
The Pakistan government last week formed a joint investigation committee to identify those involved in creating disorder in the country through “malicious social media campaigns”. No party or person has been named against whom the possible investigation would be directed. However, analysts say, the step may be targeted at the PTI party.
Hasan was arrested on Monday last week along with 11 other PTI supporters and was booked by the FIA’s cybercrime wing under Sections 9 (glorification of an offence), 10 (cyber terrorism) and 11 (electronic forgery) of the Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act (PECA). (PTI)
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