[1/2] Police officers are able to stop supporters of former Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan as he appeared before the Supreme Court in Islamabad, Pakistan on May 11, 2023…. Read more
ISLAMABAD, May 12 (Portal) – Former Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan arrived under heavy security outside a court in Islamabad on Friday as his supporters clashed with police elsewhere in the city, broadcaster Geo TV reported.
Television footage showed heavily armed paramilitary troops and police outside Islamabad’s Supreme Court as Khan was taken in a motorcade of nearly a dozen vehicles.
Khan, who wore dark glasses and wore a sky-blue shalwar kameez, the baggy shirt and trousers popular in Pakistan, entered the court surrounded by lawyers and security guards, the broadcaster said.
Geo said supporters of Khan clashed with police elsewhere in the city as the roads were cleared for his convoy. Islamabad Police have issued an emergency order banning all gatherings in the city.
Khan’s Pakistani Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI) party said thousands of “peaceful Pakistanis” were gathering in Islamabad in solidarity with their leader, who police said was allowed to meet ten people at a police guest house on Thursday night.
His arrest earlier this week, which sparked deadly unrest in the nuclear-powered state, was ruled “invalid and unlawful” by the Supreme Court on Thursday.
The Supreme Court ordered that he appear before the Islamabad High Court for a hearing on his petition to challenge the anti-corruption lawsuit against him.
The violence sparked by Khan’s arrest has exacerbated instability in the country of 220 million people at a time of deep economic crisis, with record high inflation, sluggish growth and delayed IMF funding.
Nearly 2,000 people have been arrested for violence and at least eight have been killed since Khan’s arrest on Tuesday.
Protesters have attacked military installations, ransacked the home of a senior army general in the eastern city of Lahore and torched government buildings and assets elsewhere.
Khan was arrested a day after the powerful military rebuked him for repeatedly accusing a senior officer of trying to stage his assassination and accusing the former armed forces chief of being behind his ouster last year.
The army has warned Khan’s supporters that it will respond decisively if there are further attacks on its assets, and said in a statement on Wednesday that the violence at its locations was “pre-planned” and ordered by his party leadership.
Khan’s party said it only called for peaceful protests.
writing by Shivam Patel; Edited by Raju Gopalakrishnan
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