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Pakistan: For ‘graft,’ Imran gets 14 years, wife Bushra 7 years in jail

Pakistan: For ‘graft,’ Imran gets 14 years, wife Bushra 7 years in jail

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Virendra Pandit

 

New Delhi: A Pakistani court on Friday convicted former Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Ahmed Khan Niyazi, who has been in jail since August 2023 and facing around 200 court cases since his ouster, and his wife Bushra, in a landmark case of alleged corruption, and sentenced them to 14 years and 7 years in prison, respectively.

“I will neither make any deal nor seek any relief,” Khan told reporters inside the courtroom after his conviction, the media reported.

The anti-graft court convened in the jail near the capital Islamabad where Khan is being held, and convicted him along with his wife over a welfare foundation they established together, called the Al-Qadir Trust, which the Sharif government has accused of fraud to the tune of nearly PKR 650 crore.

“The prosecution has proven its case. Khan is convicted,” said Judge Nasir Javed Rana, announcing their sentences

Faith healer Bushra Bibi, who was recently released on bail, was arrested at the court after the conviction, her spokeswoman Mashal Yousafzai said.

Khan maintains the cases are politically motivated and designed to keep him from returning to power.

Their sentence has been delayed several times over the past month, with analysts saying the jail term was being used to pressure Khan into accepting a deal with the military to step back from politics.

Since being ousted from power in 2022, Khan has launched an unprecedented campaign in which he has openly criticized the country’s powerful generals and even accused the USA of masterminding his ouster from power in April 2022.

Khan has been previously handed four convictions, two of which have been overturned while the sentences in the other two cases were suspended.

But he remained in prison over pending cases.

A United Nations panel of experts found last year that Khan’s detention “had no legal basis and appears to have been intended to disqualify him from running for political office.”

Khan was barred from standing in February’s election and his Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party was hamstrung by a widespread crackdown.

PTI won more seats than any other party in the poll, but a coalition of parties considered more pliable to the influence of the military establishment shut them out of power.

 

 

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