Former Prime Minister Imran Khan was held on Friday after a Pakistani court denied him bail in a case where he is accused of leaking state secrets, according to his attorney.
Khan is suspected of leaking a confidential cable that Pakistan’s ambassador to the US conveyed to Islamabad last year, which is the subject of the indictment. Khan, a former cricket player, disputes that, claiming that information from the cable was obtained from other media outlets.
The Islamabad High Court denied Khan’s request for bail and the dismissal of the case, according to attorney Naeem Panjutha.
He wrote, “We will challenge it,” on the social networking site X, once known as Twitter.
In nuclear-armed Pakistan, Khan has been at the epicenter of months-long political unrest, highlighting the military’s stronghold over civil society politics.
In 2022, Khan was compelled to resign following a no-confidence vote. He said that the military attempted to push him aside following his falling out with the generals over who should be appointed to senior security positions.
The military, which has sometimes controlled Pakistan’s civilian administrations and directly ruled the country for extended periods since its independence in 1947, denied orchestrating Khan’s overthrow. Because Khan had visited Moscow just before Russia invaded Ukraine, he has claimed that the cable he is accused of leaking was evidence of a plot by the United States to pressure the military to remove him from office in the 2022 parliamentary election.
The Pakistani military and the United States both refuted that. Khan has been the target of many legal actions, which he has described as an attempt to keep him out of politics.
In one corruption case, he was found guilty and given a three-year prison sentence. Although the sentence was suspended, he is still incarcerated due to other issues.
Khan, who garnered significant popular support with his conservative and nationalistic program, cannot participate in the election scheduled for early next year due to his convictions.
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