KP’s ATC decision comes after Zahid Afridi’s lawyer claims the charges are politically motivated
Mohammad Zahid Afridi, youth president of Jamaat-e-Islami and the spokesperson of Bara Tirah Political Alliance, was arrested by the police. Source: The Express Pakinomist
A special anti-terrorism court in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa has granted bail to Mohammad Zahid Afridi, a local political leader and head of Bara Political Alliance and Jamaat-e-Islami Youth Wing Tirah, in a terror case, court officials said.
Judge Fareed Khan Alizai of the Anti-Terrorism Court (ATC) heard Afridi’s bail plea and ordered that he be released on bail after arguments were concluded. Afridi was arrested on December 24 and has been in custody since then.
Read: No breakthrough in government-TTP talks as both sides refuse to budge
Afridi’s lawyer, Farhad Afridi, told the court that his client had led a peaceful sit-in in the Tirah Plain for seven months in support of peace and local grievances. The defense argued that the terrorism charges against Afridi, which include alleged incitement against the state and state institutions, were baseless and politically motivated, and that there was no concrete evidence to justify his continued detention.
Local social media posts earlier reported that Afridi was taken into custody by police in Tirah, a tribal area where tensions have been running high amid protests and calls by local political groups for peace, among other local grievances.
The case comes on the back of the Pashtun National Jirga organized by the Pashtun Tahafuz Movement in October 2024, a group that had been banned under anti-terror laws ahead of the event, which addressed complaints about security operations and rights issues in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa.
