Click to play videoNew Delhi: Iftikar Muhammad Chaudhry, the sacked Chief Justice of Pakistan, has asked for an open trial by the Supreme Judicial Council. Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf has leveled charges of misconduct and misuse of authority against him.
Chaudhry has been kept under government cover ever since he was sacked on Friday.
He was permitted to meet retired Air Marshal Asgha Ali Khan. Chaudhry has denied all charges against him and asked for a trial open to the media and lawyers' fraternity.
Khan said Chaudhry has been confined to his house for the past two days and denied access to telephone, TV and newspapers.
Meanwhile, lawyers have decided to boycott Pakistan courts on Monday and Tuesday to protest the president's removal of the Supreme Court's chief judge.
In recent weeks, Chaudhry has pressed the government to provide information on the whereabouts of dozens of missing people, said by relatives to be secretly held by Pakistani intelligence agencies.
Information Minister Mohammed Ali Durrani said on Sunday that Musharraf made the move against Chaudhry after receiving complaints about him. Durrani did not specify the alleged complaints, but he has said earlier they were related to alleged misuse of authority by Chaudhry.
Musharraf has ''presented the complaints'' to the Supreme Judicial Council, a top panel of judges that handles claims of wrongdoing in the higher judiciary, so the panel can issue an opinion, Durrani said.
The judicial council was expected to hold proceedings on Chaudhry's case on Tuesday.
Lawyers across Pakistan will boycott trials and stop work on Monday and Tuesday to protest the government's measure against Chaudhry, said Ali Ahmed Kurd, deputy chairman of the Pakistan Bar Council, the country's main lawyers' group.
The government's charges against Chaudhry are based on ''ill-intention and political motives,'' Kurd said.
He said the government wants to have judges of ''their liking,'' because it fears that ''political questions'' are going to be raised against it later this year, when Pakistan is expected to hold parliamentary elections.
(With agency inputs)
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