Search results
May 26, 2023 · As Imran Khan and his party face a country-wide crackdown, Pakistan seems to have come to a standstill. The nation is facing crippling inflation and the hottest summer in history, with...
May 9, 2024 · Imran Khan's arrest on graft charges sparked protests across Pakistan on 9 May 2023. At least 10 people were killed and hundreds wounded during the 9 May protests, which authorities also...
May 10, 2023 · Imran Khan, Pakistan's hugely popular former prime minister, was arrested on Tuesday on corruption charges - a moment he had successfully avoided for several months. Previous attempts had ended...
- 51 sec
- Farhat Javed
Aug 8, 2023 · Imran Khan's arrest this time drew little reaction after a crackdown on his party. When former prime minister Imran Khan was arrested over the weekend over corruption allegations, there was...
- Overview
- Supreme Court challenge
Police in Pakistan have arrested hundreds of supporters of ousted Prime Minister Imran Khan for violence after his arrest on corruption charges, authorities said on Wednesday, deepening a political crisis in the nuclear-armed country.
Tuesday’s arrest of the former cricket hero, and Pakistan’s most popular politician according to opinion polls, came at a precarious time for the country that is facing a shortage of foreign exchange and a months-long delay of an IMF bailout.
Mobile data services were shut for a second day while Twitter, YouTube and Facebook were disrupted, as security forces tried to restore order after violence killed one person late on Tuesday.
The government said supporters of Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party had attacked important state buildings and damaged private and public vehicles. Police said 945 of his supporters had been arrested in Punjab province after 25 police vehicles and more than 14 government buildings were set on fire.
“This can’t be tolerated. The law will take its course,” Planning Minister Ahsan Iqbal said at a news conference. “These violent attacks were not the outcome of any public outpouring. They were planned by the PTI rank and file.”
Authorities in three of Pakistan’s four provinces have imposed an emergency order banning all gatherings after Khan’s supporters clashed with police.
PTI Vice Chairman Shah Mahmood Qureshi said the party’s senior leadership was in Islamabad to meet Khan and would approach the Supreme Court to challenge an Islamabad High Court order that deemed Khan’s arrest legal.
“We continue to call PTI family workers, supporters and the people of Pakistan onto the streets for peaceful protest against this unconstitutional behaviour,” Qureshi wrote on Twitter.
The protests have disrupted business in several cities. In Peshawar, chicken seller Malagul Khan said his shop and others were destroyed in the clashes.
Raja Imran, 25, also a Peshawar resident, said, “There is total chaos across the country ... There are exams going on and school children will suffer”.
Khan was ousted as prime minister in April 2022 in a parliamentary no-confidence vote. He has not slowed his campaign against the ouster even though he was wounded in a November attack on his convoy as he led a protest march to Islamabad calling for snap general elections.
The corruption case is one of more than 100 registered against Khan since his ouster after four years in power. In most of the cases, Khan faces being barred from holding public office if convicted, with a national election scheduled for November.
- 38 sec
- Reuters
Apr 9, 2022 · Imran Khan’s tumultuous term as prime minister of Pakistan has ended, following weeks of high political drama and days of constitutional chaos. The Supreme Court’s landmark verdict late on...
May 26, 2023 · Pakistani authorities have launched a crackdown on former prime minister Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party, detaining thousands of the popular opposition leader’s supporters...
