Kulsoom back home after dramatic standoff with Pak junta

Kulsoom back home after dramatic standoff with Pak junta
AGENCE FRANCE PRESSE

LAHORE, JULY 9: Kulsoom Nawaz, wife of ousted Pakistani prime minister Nawaz Sharif, drove to her home under police escort early today, ending a 10-hour standoff with the military regime, police said.

Kulsoom had been detained in her car since yesterday, after defiantly breaking a police cordon trying to prevent her leading a cross-country procession.

Police said she was under arrest, but state-run television said she had merely been stopped on the side of the road to prevent her from breaking a law against political rallies.

Kulsoom has become an outspoken critic of the military regime since the military ousted her husband from power in October.

Police said she dashed through roadblocks accompanied by members of Sharif's Pakistan Muslim League (PML), but was arrested some six km away after a bizarre chase through the streets of Lahore.

Driven by her chauffeur, she was accompanied by two PML leaders, Javed Hashmi and Tehmina Daultana, witnesses said.

Several dozen police vehicles surrounded her car in a wealthy suburb of Lahore, the capital of Punjab province, before it was towed to a government rest house, where officials said she had been detained.

But an AFP correspondent said Kulsoom had locked the doors and refused to get out of the car.