Pakistani authorities in Punjab province on Monday night extended the detention of Jamaatud Dawa chief Hafiz Saeed for another two months. His detention was to expire tonight but the Punjab government issued a notification just before midnight to extend his house arrest.
He was house arrested on January 30 this year for three months. JuD had also been put on terrorist watch list. JuD's charity arm Falah-i-Insaaniyat was also put on the terror watch-list.
A notification by Home Ministry of Punjab province said that Hafiz Saeed detention at his residence is extended for another two months. Hafiz Saeed is wanted by India on his alleged involvement in Mumbai attacks case. He has also been declared as terrorist by US and the UN.
Hafiz Saeed and his aides have challenged their detention in Lahore High Court but the case is still pending.
Crackdown on Hafiz Saeed and aides came on last date on January this year after media reports in Pakistani newspapers claimed that US has categorically threatened sanctions if Pakistan did not ban JuD. But Pakistani authorities denied any such warning by the US authorities.
Meanwhile JuD has already changed its name replacing it with Tehrik-i-Azadi-i Kashmir.. UN and US has already declared JuD as terrorist organization but Pakistan was yet to ban it as JuD had gotten a reprieve from Lahore High Court.
India has long been accusing JuD and Hafiz Saeed of launching terrorist attacks in India.
A front page report in The News and Urdu daily Jang in January has reported that the United States assistant secretary of state in his meeting with Jalil Abbbas Jilani, the then Pakistani High Commissioner to the US, on January 11 this year raised the issue in the Asia Pacific Group on Money Laundering (APG)’s latest report.
Reportedly, in the latest APG report, some key objections were raised regarding the activities and the financial traffic of JuD. Pakistani High Commissioner Jilani was confronted and asked to convey Islamabad to declare JuD as banned organization otherwise the US will put Pakistan in the blacklist of the countries in the International Cooperative Review Group (ICRG).
In case of being blacklisted, Pakistan has to tender a request for each of its international transaction through the international financial institutions.
The report said that Pakistani high commissioner after the meeting sent a detailed letter to the Foreign Office cautioning the government and asking to decide the matter. The letter also informed the authorities that Pakistan has to write back a report by January 31 regarding the objections of the APG and the US administration.
The sources claimed that the Foreign Office has discussed the issue respectively with Finance Minister Ishaq Dar and National Security Adviser Lt Gen (retd) Nasir Janjua.
JuD chief Hafiz Saeed remained defiant despite the crackdown and alleged that US is pressurizing Pakistan to ban his organization on the behest of India. "We will go to the court if any such ban if imposed on JuD," he said in a statement issued after his arrest in January.
Pakistan's State bank had ordered in January last year to freeze all the assets of JuD including its bank accounts.