Imran Khan defends KP police against criticism over Asma murder case

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) chief Imran Khan on Thursday defended under-fire Khyber Pakhtunkhwa police, saying there can be no comparison between “the autonomous, depoliticized and professional KP police and totally politicized and non-professional Sindh and Punjab police.”

The KP police have received a lot of flak from the Supreme Court and political opponents of the PTI lately over failure to trace out the culprit behind the grisly rape and murder of four-year-old Asma.

In a statement on his official Twitter account, Imran Khan said: “There can be no comparison between the autonomous, depoliticised and professional KP police and totally politicised and non professional Sindh and Punjab police.”

He further said: “The KP Police Act has completely depoliticised the police force, whereas in Sindh and Punjab the police is used to victimise opponents and on occasions kill them extra judicially.”

While hearing the Asma rape-murder case, Chief Justice of Pakistan Mian Saqib Nisar had expressed dissatisfaction with progress in the case, questioning the competence of the KP police.

Minor girl, Asma, went missing on January 13 from Jandarpar Gujjar Garhi area of Mardan and her body was later found in sugarcane fields in the same area on January 17.

According to the post-mortem report, she was subjected to sexual assault and torture before her captors strangulated her to death.

A day earlier, Railways Minister Khawaja Saad Rafique slammed the KP police, saying  the KP police’s failure to arrest the perpetrators behind the murder of “Mashal Khan, Asma, and Aasma was bad governance.”