Pakistan police attempt to arrest former prime minister Imran Khan
- Pakistan’s media regulator has also banned broadcasts of Khan’s speeches, effective Monday and both recorded and live speeches by Khan
- Khan is accused of failing to declare gifts received during his time in office or the profit made from selling them
Officers from the capital, Islamabad, arrived at Khan’s home in the eastern city of Lahore, which was surrounded by hundreds of his supporters, but were unable to carry out the arrest.
Pakistan’s media regulator has also banned broadcasts of Khan’s speeches, officials said on Monday.
The ban by the Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority was imposed on Sunday and went into effect on Monday. It covers airing of both recorded and live speeches by Khan.
“A team of Islamabad police has arrived in Lahore to arrest Imran Khan to comply with the court orders,” Islamabad police said in a tweet.
“Imran Khan is reluctant to surrender – the superintendent of police had gone into the room but Imran Khan was not present there.”
The arrest warrant was issued after Khan failed to appear in court in a corruption case on February 28.
Khan is accused of failing to declare gifts received during his time in office or the profit made from selling them.
Government officials must declare all gifts but are allowed to keep those below a certain value.
Khan later spoke to party workers in his Zaman Park house in Lahore, where police remained outside.
“I am being summoned in fake cases and the nation should know about them,” he said.
“It will be a bad omen for the country if the nation does not stand against the corrupt rulers.”
The vice-chairman of Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party, Shah Mehmood Qureshi, earlier told reporters in Lahore: “We have received the notice from Islamabad police – the notice does not contain any order for the arrest.
“We will consult our lawyers and follow the legal process.”
Pakistan’s courts are often used to tie up politicians in tedious and long-winded proceedings that rights monitors have criticised for stifling political opposition.
Khan, who was shot in the leg during a rally last year, has attempted to disrupt politics in the South Asian nation since he was forced out of office in a no-confidence vote in April.
He has been pushing for early polls due no later than October by holding protests, pulling out of parliament and dissolving the two provincial assemblies his party controls in a bid to force the government’s hand.
The nation of more than 220 million is in dire economic straits with runaway inflation, scant foreign exchange reserves and stalling bailout talks with the International Monetary Fund.
To pull the country out of its spiral, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif is battling to revive the next tranche of a US$6.5 billion loan deal sketched with the International Monetary Fund in 2019.
04:14
Former Pakistan PM Imran Khan charged with terrorism, supporters gather to block his arrest
Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (PEMRA) said on Sunday that television channels have been banned from broadcasting Khan’s speeches in an order that accuses Khan of “baseless accusations and spreading hate speech” against state institutions and officers.
Khan’s actions are “prejudicial to the maintenance of law and order and is likely to disturb public peace and tranquillity,” PEMRA said late on Sunday while directing all satellite channels not to broadcast any of his recorded or live news conference or speech. Licences will be suspended if the order is not complied with, it added.
Khan has been demanding a snap election since his removal from office in a parliamentary vote early last year, a demand that was rejected by his successor Shehbaz Sharif, who has said the vote would be held as scheduled later this year.
Khan led countrywide protest campaigns to press for an early vote last year and was shot at and wounded at one of the rallies.
Referring to his absence from court and the shooting incident, Khan said on Sunday: “They [the police] know there is a threat against my life,” adding that the courts did not provide adequate security.
“I bow only in front of god and no other power or institution,” Khan told cheering supporters at his residence in Lahore on Sunday. “This is our war for real freedom,” he added, blaming Sharif and his government of sweeping corruption.
Attempting to arrest Imran Khan on fake and flimsy cases will be extremely destabilising in a system that is already under stress.
Khan is required to appear in court on March 7. If he fails to do so, police will be required to arrest him and present him to court, according to Interior Minister Rana Sanaullah.
“The police must arrest him,” Akbar Nasir Khan, inspector-general of the Islamabad police, told local media. “We appeal to the people not to hinder the legal process.”
“Attempting to arrest Imran Khan on fake and flimsy cases will be extremely destabilising in a system that is already under stress,” Hammad Azhar, a senior leader from Khan’s Tehreek-e-Insaf party, told Bloomberg News.
“There will be countrywide protests.”
