Pakistan arrests opposition leaders ahead of planned rallies

Nawaz Sharif is the head of the Pakistan Muslim League N party. Photograph: Farooq Naeem/AFP/Getty images

The crisis engulfing Pakistan deepened this morning after the government issued orders for opposition leaders, including Imran Khan and Nawaz Sharif, to be placed under house arrest ahead of planned rallies against the ruling administration.

Police have arrested scores of lawyers and opposition leaders today and, according to reports on Pakistani television, orders have been issued for the detention of Sharif, the head of the Pakistan Muslim League N party (PML-N), his brother Shabhaz Sharif, the Jamat-e-Islami leader, Qazi Hussain Ahmed, and Khan, who is the head of Tehreek-e-Insaf.

Many opposition leaders are said to have gone into hiding. Pakistani lawyers, supported by opposition leaders, are due to begin a protest tomorrow dubbed the long march to demand the restoration of judges removed from office by the former president Pervez Musharraf.

President Asif Ali Zardari, husband of the assassinated former prime minister Benazir Bhutto, has failed to fulfil a pledge to restore the justices since being elected last year.

The clampdown will increase fears for the stability of the country as the government struggles to contain violent extremists.

Six Pakistani policemen and a bus driver were killed, and six Sri Lankan cricket players and two team officials wounded last week when heavily armed men attacked a bus carrying the visiting team to the venue of the second test against Pakistan.

Rao Iftikhar, the home secretary in eastern Punjab province, said he issued orders for a ban on public gatherings there "so that terrorists cannot take any advantage by targeting political gatherings".

The ban , which gives authorities the right to arrest any protesters, will remain in force for three months, he said.

Punjab is Pakistan's most powerful and populous province and the political stronghold of the PML-N.

Last week's attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team came amid protests following a court ruling banning the former minister Sharif and his brother, who was the chief minister of Punjab, from political office.

In August last year Sharif pulled his party out of a coalition with Zardari's Pakistan People's party (PPP), because of the failure to restore the judiciary. His supporters saw the latest court ruling as a political move engineered by Zardari.

The planned long march would see protesters gather in cities around the country tomorrow before leaving for the capital, Islamabad. They have vowed to stage a sit-in at the parliament building until the judiciary is restored.

The Sindh province home secretary, Arif Ahmed Khan, announced a 15-day ban on public gatherings today to "prevent a bad law-and-order situation". Sindh is the main stronghold of the ruling PPP.

A spokesman for Sharif's party, Sadiqul Farooq, said he received reports from party offices across the country that members were being arrested, but he had no accurate numbers.

Munawar Hassan, a Jamaat-e-Islami leader, said: "Nearly two dozen of our supporters have been detained."

Farhatullah Babar, a spokesman for Zardari, said 18 people had been arrested and would be released once the situation calmed down.

"Some people have announced they are going to defy the ban on public meetings," he said. "It is sad, but this is what the law says."

In the Punjabi city of Multan, the senior police officer Fayyaz Ahmad said 42 Sharif supporters were arrested and "would be dealt with according to the law".