ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s main opposition party said yesterday it would boycott a banquet being hosted by the prime minister for Turkey’s premier, as a protest against the Pakistani leader’s conviction for contempt.
The snub from opposition leader Nawaz Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League-N is likely to embarrass Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani in front of his visiting Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who is widely admired in Pakistan.
On April 26, Gilani became Pakistan’s first sitting prime minister to be convicted in court, for refusing to ask the Swiss authorities to reopen corruption cases against President Asif Ali Zardari.
Gilani had refused on the grounds that the head of state enjoys immunity.
The PML-N has demanded that Gilani resign, saying the conviction disqualifies him from office and has called for early elections, not due before February 2013.
“No one (from the party) is going to the dinner, because we do not recognize him as prime minister,” PML-N media coordinator Asim Niazi said.
Erdogan flew into Islamabad on Sunday for a three-day official visit. He is due to address a joint session of parliament before the banquet later Monday.
Senior PML-N leaders said, however, that the party would set domestic politics aside to attend the parliamentary session, because “Erdogan is our honored guest.”
Restored
Pakistan restored access to Twitter after briefly blocking the microblog over “blasphemous” posts about a Facebook competition.
The website was blocked Sunday by the telecoms authority on the orders of the IT ministry amid accusations it refused to remove messages about the Facebook contest.
But the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority restored access to Twitter in the evening, several hours after it was cut off, said spokesman Mohammad Younes Khan.
The reason for the U-turn was not immediately clear. Khan said it was the IT ministry’s decision and he did not know why it had been taken, and no one from the ministry or Twitter was available for comment.
Speaking before the ban was lifted Sunday, Khan said that there was “blasphemous material” on Twitter and that the organizers of the competition had been “trying to hurt Muslim feelings.” Islam bans images of the Prophet.
“Both Facebook and Twitter were involved. We negotiated with both. Facebook has agreed to remove the stuff but Twitter is not responding to us,” he said.
Facebook confirmed that it had blocked content in Pakistan after a request from the authorities.
Pakistan opposition boycotts PM dinner for Erdogan
