ISLAMABAD: Former prime minister Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party denied on Saturday it had hired a foreign law firm to represent its top leader in international courts to highlight his detention in a high-security prison for about a month.
Khan was arrested from his residence in the eastern city of Lahore on Aug. 5 after a trial court found him guilty in a case involving illegal sale of state gifts during his stint in power. While the Islamabad High Court (IHC) suspended his three-year sentence and granted him bail in the case, Khan continued to stay behind bars since he was accused of compromising the secret diplomatic communication system by mishandling a confidential cable dispatched from Washington last year.
The PTI announced from its official social media account on platform X that the former PM had hired the internationally renowned barrister Geoffrey Ronald Robertson to represent him in international courts in cases related to “unlawful detention and human rights abuses.”
However, it later deleted the post and denied the information.
“There is no truth in the misleading reports being circulated about a foreign law firm, nor is any such initiative supported by the jailed Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf Chairman Imran Khan,” the party said in a statement. “We have not approached any judicial forum outside Pakistan nor have any intention to do so.”
The PTI has faced a countrywide crackdown since Khan’s first brief arrest on May 9 for suspected graft sparked widespread protests that saw mobs ransacking state installations, including military assets.
The party statement maintained that thousands of its workers, including senior leaders and women supporters, had since been imprisoned and deprived of justice and their rights.
“In addition to being the target of a murderous attack and sabotaging the investigation of the attack, more than 180 false and fake cases were established against Imran Khan in just 16 months,” it continued.
“However, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf demands rights from the Pakistani system of justice and calls for effective measures for the supremacy of the constitution and the rule of law from the justice system of the country,” it added.
The former prime minister is currently facing a prison trial in a special court under the Official Secrets Act of the country.
