Karachi: In wake of growing calls for arrest of the controversial Pakistani cleric, a Pakistani court has issued an arrest warrant for Red Mosque Imam Abdul Aziz, who allegedly justified the heinous Peshawar school attack by Taliban.
The cleric, who is also known as 'Mullah Burqa', is accused of threatening the protesters outside the Red Mosque after he refused to condemn the deadly Taliban massacre in Peshawar school that killed over 140 children.
According to a local Pak media report, the cleric in one of his recent sermons on December 19, referred to the Taliban as “our brothers” and said that the attack on school was a 'justified' act of retaliation by the Taliban.
Enraged by the cleric's blatant remark, Pakistani civil society groups have called for his execution as well.
The cleric earned himself the moniker - 'Mullah Burqa' – after he fled Red Mosque military raid in 2007 in a burqa. However, later he was caught and paraded through the capital on television live.
Abdul Aziz, is known to be a pro-Taliban cleric and earlier this year he was in news for renaming a school library in the honour of al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.
Pakistan's issue of arrest warrant against Abdul Aziz comes as a part of the government's stepped-up efforts to crack down on terrorism after a Taliban assault on a Peshawar school killed more than a hundred of innocent souls.
Other than intensifying its military operation Zarb-e-Azb against terrorists, Pakistani government also lifted the moratorium on capital punishment in terror cases, and has so far hanged six terror convicts after President Mamnoon Hussain turned down their mercy pleas.
