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Islamabad: A firebrand leader of Pakistani lawyers' association Ali Ahmad Kurd was released yesterday after four months under house arrest, officials said.
Kurd remained in detention at Quetta, his ancestral home town and capital of southwestern Balochistan province.
His release two days after president of Supreme Court Bar Association, Aitzaz Ahasn, was freed from similar confinement at his home in Punjab province capital, Lahore.
Meanwhile, lawyers and civil society activists demonstrated yesterday near the police guarded residence of deposed chief Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry in Islamabad's judicial enclave against his detention along with family members.
A day earlier police used teargas to keep protesters away from the residence of the former head of the Supreme Court, following reports the authorities had allowed his children to go to their educational institutions for daily classes.
Lawyers have been agitating for the reinstatement of Justice Chaudhry and scores of other judges of superior courts thrown out in November by President Pervez Mushaarraf after imposing a state emergency, which he later lifted.
Pakistan Muslim League-N of former prime minister Nawaz Sharif, the second largest party in the newly elected National Assembly after the Pakistan Peoples Party, has made restoration of sacked judges its top priority in the new parliament.
Both parties have agreed to work out modalities for resolving the burning issue in the assembly, which is expected to be convened this month.
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