Pakistan ex-PM Khan indicted in leaked documents case
AFP | Rawalpindi, Pakistan
The Daily Tribune – www.newsofbahrain.com
Jailed former Pakistan prime minister Imran Khan was indicted yesterday for allegedly leaking classified documents, a charge set to keep him in custody in the countdown to national elections due early next year.
Since being ousted in 2022, Khan has been tangled in a slew of legal cases he says are designed to stop him from contesting polls in January, while his party has faced a massive crackdown. A spokesman for Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party said he was charged under the colonial-era Official Secrets Act in a trial “conducted within the court premises with no access to public or media”.
The case relates to a diplomatic cable the 71-year-old allegedly touted as proof of a “conspiracy ” behind the no - confidence vote which turfed him out of office last April.
“We are going to challenge it,” Khan’s lawyer Umar Khan Niazi told reporters outside the jail where the special court was convened. Khan’s lawyers say the crime he has been charged with carries a possible 14-year prison term, and in the most extreme circumstances, the death penalty.
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