ISLAMABAD — The sudden house arrest of a high-profile Islamist cleric in Pakistan on Monday sparked peaceful protests Tuesday by his followers, who condemned it as a government effort to appease the Trump administration after it banned visitors and refugees from seven Muslim-majority countries over the weekend — and a top presidential aide hinted that Pakistan could be added to the list.
Supporters of Hafiz Saeed, the fiery leader of the Jamaat-ud-Dawa movement, contended that the move by Pakistani officials had also come at the behest of India, Pakistan’s Hindu-led rival and neighbor. The group zealously opposes India’s claim to the disputed Kashmir border region, and a previous militant group led by Saeed, Lashkar-e-Taiba, was blamed for the 2008 terrorist siege that killed 164 people in the Indian city of Mumbai.
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‘‘There was pressure coming from the US on Pakistani authorities to either arrest Hafiz Saeed or face the sanctions, and the government succumbed to that pressure,’’ Nadeem Awan, a spokesman for Saeed, said Tuesday.