Shehbaz rejects PTI's claims on rights abuses

ISLAMABAD: Rejecting Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf's (PTI) 'propaganda' against rights abuses in the country, Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said on Monday that every case related to the violence committed by the party on May 9 is being dealt with due process under the law, media reports said.

Taking to Twitter, the Prime Minister wrote: "I assure everyone that the culprits are being dealt with under the law and that I will ensure that no rights violations take place," The News reported.

Violent protests erupted in Pakistan on May 9 leaving dozens injured across several cities with demonstrators attacking military buildings after former Prime Minister Imran Khan was arrested.

The police launched a crackdown against all those allegedly involved in the violence, vowing to hold each one of them accountable. However, PTI is holding demonstrations overseas and claiming in international media that human rights violations are taking place in Pakistan.

Sharif said Pakistan fully respects and is committed to all its constitutional and international obligations on human rights.

He said the PTI chief in his interviews with international media outlets is openly and deliberately disinforming local and foreign audiences by "glib-talk laced with fake news and plain misrepresentation", The News reported.

"His expedient description of the post-May 9 events as 'human rights abuses' and 'stifling of the right to political protest' is not only misleading, but aimed at manipulating and swaying opinion-makers outside the country," Sharif wrote.

The premier categorically stated that what PTI did on May 9 was a "brazen attack on the state of Pakistan, with malafide intent and sinister objectives".

"No country in the world will tolerate such an attempt at destroying its integrity," he said, The News reported.