Pakistan ex-PM granted bail after arrest cancelled
Pakistan former prime minister Imran Khan was granted two weeks of bail by Islamabad High Court on Friday in a graft case, AFP quoted private television channel Geo News as reporting.
The court approved the bail after the Supreme Court on Thursday said his arrest earlier in the week, which ignited deadly protests and a tussle with the military, was “invalid and unlawful”.
“They had no justification to arrest me. I was abducted. It seems as if there was a law of jungle,” Khan told British news outlet The Independent at the Islamabad High Court, Reuters reported.
“The Islamabad High Court has given a two-week bail and also ordered the (anti-graft body) not to arrest Imran Khan during this period,” his lawyer Faisal Chaudhry told Reuters.
Khan, 70, is a cricket hero-turned-politician who was ousted as prime minister in April 2022 in a parliamentary no-confidence vote and who is Pakistan’s most popular leader according to opinion polls.
Many cities in Pakistan saw violent protests following his arrest by the anti-graft agency in a land fraud case on Tuesday.
At least eight people have been killed in the violence that has worsened the country’s instability and doused hopes of resumption of a crucial International Monetary Fund bailout.
The army, which remains Pakistan’s most powerful institution, having ruled it directly for close to half its 75-year history through three coups, has warned against further attacks on its assets and has called the violence “pre-planned”.