Interior Minister Rana Sanaullah has said that former Prime Minister Imran Khan will be tried in a military court for “orchestrating the May 9 riots”.

The federal minister made these comments while speaking to Dawn News on Tuesday.

PTI chairman Imran Khan’s arrest in connection with the Al Qadir Trust case triggered nationwide protests. At least eight people were killed and about 290 were injured in the May 9 riots. Since then 1,900 protestors have been arrested.

Rana Sanaullah accused Khan of personally planning the attacks on military installations.

When asked if he would be tried in the military court, Sanaullah replied, “Absolutely, why shouldn’t he? The programme that he made to target the military installations and then had it executed, in my understanding absolutely is a case of a military court.”

“He carried it all out. He is the architect of all this discord,” Sanaullah said.

He went on to add that the evidence is documented in his tweets and messages. “All this [planning] was decided before he went [to jail] that who will do what and where. And when he is arrested, what would be the strategy and duties? All of this was decided.”

Military installations, including the residence of the corps commander in Lahore and the army’s General Headquarters in Rawalpindi, were targeted by PTI protesters.

So far, the government has handed over 33 suspects to the commanding officer. They will be tried in military courts following the attacks on army installations during violent protests in support of the former prime minister.

“Only 19 accused had been handed over to the military in Punjab and 14 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa,” Interior Minister Rana Sanaullah told reporters last week. “The accused who are being handed over to the military are those who trespassed and entered very sensitive defense installations.”

Statistics

499 FIRs were registered

88 cases – out of 499 – were registered under Anti-Terrorism Act

411 cases were registered under other laws

3,946 people – 2,588 in Punjab and 1,099 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa – were arrested under ATA

5,536 people have been arrested in other cases. Almost 80% have been freed on bail.

Only 6 FIRs – out of 499 – are being processed. Two are being processed in Punjab and four in KP. A possible trial of this could be done in military court.