ISLAMABAD, Jan 31: The one man commission constituted by the Supreme Court of Pakistan to probe the 2007 Lal Masjid operation has decided to summon former military ruler General (retired) Pervez Musharraf and former prime minister Shaukat Aziz for questioning.

According to an official not wanting to be named, said that Musharraf and Mr Aziz would be summoned in the second week of February.

The commission decided to summon the former military ruler and former prime minister, after a number of witnesses in their statements alleged that Mr Musharraf was responsible for launching the military operation on Lal Masjid in July 2007.

Testifying before the commission headed by Justice Shehzado Sheikh of the Federal Shariat Court (FSC), on December 31, 2012, Khateeb Lal Masjid, Maulana Abdul Aziz, had said that “Gen Musharraf was against our religious ideology.

In his tenure the district management started demolishing 80 mosques in the federal capital.

That was why students of Jamia Faridia started protesting against him.”

Gen Musharraf branded Lal Masjid supporters as terrorists and ultimately launched a military operation against them, he said.

Similarly, Majid Younis alias Umme Hassan, the spouse of Maulana Aziz also alleged that Gen Musharraf, General (retired) Rashid Qureshi then spokesman of the president house and a serving three star general Waheed Arshad then director general inter-services public relations were responsible for the Lal Masjid operation.

Most of the witnesses including the employees of Jamia Faridia and Jamia Hafsa — the two seminaries operating under the administrative control of Lal Masjid — also held Mr Musharraf responsible for the 2007 Lal Masjid operation.

On Thursday, the commission recorded the statements of PML-Q leader Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain, former religious affairs minister Mohammad Ijazul Haq and former state minister Tariq Azeem.

In their statements, the former ministers of Musharraf’s cabinet told the commission that they had tried to defuse the situation and did their best to convince the Lal Masjid management to surrender but all their efforts were in vain.

The commission would record the statements of former minister for women development Sumera Malik, former information minister Mohammad Ali Durrani, Chaudhry Wajahat Hussain brother of Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain and a former member of National Assembly Shah Abdul Aziz, a close friend of clerics at the Lal Masjid, on Friday (today).