IHC Bar Association suspends 60 lawyers' membership for avoiding strike call.

LAHORE -- The membership of 60 Islamabad High Court Bar Association (IHCBA) members was suspended for not responding to a strike call by the Pakistan Bar Council and the Islamabad Bar Council, it emerged on Saturday.

As lawyers in the capital observed a nationwide strike on Friday, the ICHBA had also decided to boycott an oath-taking ceremony for new judges at the high court over the IHC chief justice's decision to suspend the practising licence of IHCBA Secretary Umair Baloch.

A letter written by the joint secretary of the IHCBA, Advocate Waqar Ahmed Gondal, to the IBC vice chairman Haroon Rashid stated: "Despite strike notice issued by the Pakistan Bar Council as well as Islamabad Bar Council, the following lawyers have disobeyed the directions issued by your good office, therefore, their membership of Islamabad High Court Bar Association is suspended forthwith.

"[...] And this reference is forwarded for necessary disciplinary action, as your good self has already announced [an] order of the suspension of their respective licenses to practice for one month," the letter added, in an apparent reference to a speech by Rashid in which he said that the licences of the lawyers who did not observe the strike would be suspended.

On Friday, lawyers across the country, on the call of legal bodies, boycotted courts to protest against the registration of cases against those lawyers who were arrested for their involvement in the rampage at Lahore's Punjab Institute of Cardiology (PIC) earlier this week.

The lawyers were responding to a strike call by the PBC. A notification issued by the PBC had said the...