Zardari to hold meeting with Tahirul Qadri in Lahore today: sources

LAHORE: Pakistan Peoples’ Party (PPP) co-chairman Asif Ali Zardari is expected to hold a key meeting with Pakistan Awami Tehreek (PAT) chief Tahirul Qadri today in Lahore, sources informed ARY News.

The meeting between two political leaders come at a time when Qadri is mulling to stage a protest to press the government for resignation of Punjab Law Minister Rana Sanaullah and provincial Chief Minister Shehbaz Sharif after release of Model Town inquiry report.

According to sources, the PPP co-chairman had a telephonic conversation with the PAT chief on Wednesday night and assured Qadri of extending his support.

The two leaders agreed to bring the people responsible for the Model Town massacre to justice, sources said.

Opposition leader Khursheed Shah along with Qamar Zaman Kaira is expected to accompany Zardari during the meeting today.

Earlier today, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) chairman Imran Khan expressed his support to the PAT chief. “We will join Qadri, if he protests to seek justice,” Khan said.

Speaking to media a day earlier, Qadri called upon his party workers to remain ready for any sort of call from the party leadership.

He repeated before the media the important points of the Model Town report in which the tribunal pointed fingers at Punjab Law Minister Rana Sanaullah and Shahbaz Sharif.

In light of Model Town inquiry findings, the PAT chief claimed that the transfer of IG Balochistan to Punjab showed that federal government led by then PM Nawaz Sharif was also involved in the massacre.

Punjab government on Tuesday released the report of the judicial inquiry carried out into the 2014 Model Town incident hours after larger bench of the Lahore High Court (LHC) ordered the government to release the report regarding the incident which left at least 14 people dead and several others injured.

Amongst other conclusions, the report said that Chief Minister Punjab Shahbaz Sharif did not pass the “disengagement” order as he claimed before the judicial commission. It also maintains that the operation planned and designed under the then Punjab Law Minister Rana Sanaullah “could have easily been avoided” and that the “police officers actively participated in the massacre”.