Imran Khan, a former prime minister of Pakistan, was detained by police on Saturday at his residence in the eastern city of Lahore after a court found him guilty of asset concealment and sentenced him to three years in prison.
The well-liked opposition leader has been imprisoned twice already this year.
Khan’s political career may be over after receiving a prison sentence because the law prohibits those with criminal convictions from holding or running for public office. His Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party, or PTI, denounced the verdict and declared it will be appealed to a higher court.
Khan is finally barred from politics by the nation’s electoral commission, even though a superior court has the power to vacate the sentence.
After finding Khan guilty, the Islamabad court issued the warrant for his arrest. According to senior police official Ali Nasir Rizvi, authorities moved swiftly to transport the famous politician from his residence to Islamabad, the capital of Pakistan. Khan’s destination was not immediately apparent.
Khan has faced more than 150 legal cases since being removed from power in a no-confidence vote in parliament in April 2022, including several on charges of corruption, terrorism, and inciting violence over deadly protests in May that saw his supporters attack government and military property all over the nation. Khan, a former cricket player turned politician, is still the most prominent opponent despite being removed.
The asset concealment trial, according to PTI spokesman Rauf Hasan, was “the worst in history and akin to the murder of justice.”
Maryam Aurangzeb, the information minister, denied that Khan’s arrest had anything to do with the elections that will take place later this year. She claimed that Khan had been given every chance to refute the allegations of asset hiding. Imran Khan, she claimed, “used the time to stall this case by repeatedly visiting the high court and supreme court to delay the court proceedings.”
Khan has “been proven guilty of illegal practises, corruption, concealing assets, and incorrectly declaring wealth in tax returns,” continued Aurangzeb. Imran Khan Imran Khan Imran Khan
A group of pro-Khan lawyers in Lahore went to his Zaman Park residence and yelled anti-conviction and anti-arrest slogans.
Over the years, Pakistan has experienced its fair share of military interventions and arrests of past prime ministers.
Khan is Pakistan’s seventh detained former prime minister. In 1979, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto was detained and hanged. Nawaz Sharif, the brother of the current prime minister and a former prime minister, was detained numerous times on suspicion of corruption.
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