Staff Report
LAHORE: Mian Dawood, the counsel for Naveed Mehr, the prime suspect under investigation for the attack on Pakistan’s former prime minister Imran Khan, has alleged that the joint investigation team (JIT) probing the Wazirabad incident twisted facts, and the latest forensic report has exposed their ‘distorted’ inquiry.
Addressing a press conference in Lahore, Dawood claimed that the JIT prepared the report in consultation with the lawyers of Imran Khan to twist facts and save the former premier from being nominated in the murder of Moazam Gondal, who was shot and killed after he was hit by a bullet during the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s long march in Punjab province’s eastern city of Wazirabadin in November 2022.
Mian Dawood said that “the whole case was washed away” by the press conference of Fawad Chaudhry soon after the attack.
JIT prepared the report in consultation with PTI lawyers
“The JIT prepared its report at Imran Khan’s Zaman Park residence with the advice of PTI lawyers. The JIT changed the inquiry report on the advice of the PTI lawyers,” the suspect’s counsel claimed.
He said that Moazam Gondal died after he was hit by a bullet fired from an unspecified location. He said that it was a strange claim that bullet(s) hit Imran Khan without piercing the container he was riding.
He claimed that most of the bullets were fired from Imran Khan’s container after the first show rang out. The suspect’s counsel said that the JIT carried out the inquiry through a political angle and twisted the facts.
He said that journalists carried out more authentic probe into the incident than the JIT. He questioned how the JIT report reached Fawad Chaudhry and Imran Khan when the inquiry was under way and it was supposed to be a confidential inquiry report.
He claimed that the JIT changed the report to save Imran Khan from being nominated and charged with the killing of Moazam Gondal, whose death, he demanded, should be probed and it must not be swet under the carpet.
The counsel for the suspect asked how PTI leader Ijaz Chaudhry knew a day before that the incident could occur.
He said that a drama was staged to rejuvenate the PTI’s long march, which was doomed to fail.The counsel said the PTI leaders cannot nominate Naveed Mehr in the FIR as they have no evidence to support their claim.
He said that the prosecution and the PTI were still reluctant to lodge the actual FIR and they were escaping from filing the FIR of the Wazirabad incident.
Mian Dawood claimed that the forensic report did not establish Naveed’s involvement and it exposed the whole drama staged for political gains. He claimed that Imran Khan is a beneficiary of the whole drama.
