The investigation wing of police in Lahore arrested former prime minister Imran Khan on Sunday in a dozen May 9 cases, including the Jinnah House (Corps Commander’s House) attack, sources said.
Lahore police arrived at the Adiala Jail to formally arrest and interrogate him, they added.
The PTI founder’s legal battles got worse on Sunday when the national-graft buster arrested them in a state gifts reference hours after a court acquitted both in the unlawful marriage case. Khan is accused of illegally acquiring and selling 74 watches as the prime minister, according to the inquiry report.
The former prime minister has long denied such accusations against him and accused the security establishment of cases against him.
According to sources, the court rejected the police’s request to transfer Khan to Lahore due to security concerns.
The PTI founder would be presented before the anti-terrorism court in Lahore through a video link where a request for remand would be made for an investigation into the Jinnah House attack.
Earlier in the day, an accountability court sent Khan and his spouse Bushra Bibi to jail on an eight-day remand in a new Toshakhana reference.
A government notification stated that the court may conduct the trial of the accused persons in jail if deemed necessary in view of the law and order situation. The lawyers of former Prime Minister Imran Khan and Bushra Bibi have been informed about the jail trial.
In the hearing, Khan urged the accountability court judge, Muhammad Ali Warraich, to release his wife Bushra Bibi in the new state gifts case against them.
“Me and my wife have no link to the Toshakhana,” Khan told the judge. “I have read the Quran four times in jail and Allah has placed a great responsibility on the judges.”
He claimed that his wife was being jailed only to inflict him pain. Without naming the individual, Khan claimed that his wife was being “targeted” by the “king”. He said: “I removed him from the post of Inter-Services Intelligence chief and my wife did not make any recommendation for that.”
Also, read this
Form 47 case will be next after SC’s decision on reserved seats, says PML-N’s Hiraj
UN Secretary General calls for ‘positive’ development in Imran’s imprisonment
Imran Khan’s imprisonment Pak’s ‘internal matter’: US official
The former premier urged the judge to imprison him and free his wife. “You are answerable to Allah, not the ISI,” Khan told the judge.
A total of “16 cases” have been registered against Khan, out of which he has already obtained bail in four cases.
Before his arrest in May 9 cases, sources in the jail had said that the investigation team had questioned the PTI chief about his speeches and addressing party workers.
Earlier this month, a UN panel of experts found Khan’s detention “had no legal basis and appears to have been intended to disqualify him from running for political office”.
“Thus, from the outset, that prosecution was not grounded in law and was reportedly instrumentalised for a political purpose,” it said, calling for his immediate release after nearly a year in jail.
