RAWALPINDI: Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) founder Imran Khan has barred his sons from visiting Pakistan, emphasising that they will not participate in any protests.
The former prime minister’s sons were in the United States meeting the country’s lawmakers, reportedly to lobby for their father’s release, ahead of their expected visit to Pakistan before the August 5 protest.
Khan’s sister, Aleema Khan, had claimed that his sons — Suleman Khan (28) and Kasim Khan (26) — would be taking part in the protest, which would be staged for the ex-premier’s release.
“My sons will not be coming to Pakistan. They will neither be part of any protest nor will they lead any protest,” Khan, who was ousted as the prime minister in April 2022, told reporters in Adiala jail.
In response to a question that his sister claimed that his sons would take part in the protests, he said: “I am telling you, they aren’t coming to Pakistan and they will not take part in any protest.”
PTI Chairman Barrister Gohar Ali Khan also said that the party is not in contact with the sons, but it is their right to meet their father.
The 71-year-old cricketer-turned-politician has been behind bars since August 2023 after he was booked in multiple cases ranging from corruption to terrorism since his ouster from power via the opposition’s no-trust motion in April 2022.
Kasim called attention to their father’s imprisonment for the first time publicly in May. Taking to X in June, he expressed concern over Imran’s condition in the jail.
He wrote: “My father, former prime minister Imran Khan, has now spent over 700 days in prison — held in solitary confinement. He is denied access to his lawyers, not allowed visits from his family, fully cut off from us (his children), and even his personal doctor is refused entry. This is not justice. It is a deliberate attempt to isolate and break a man who stands for rule of law, democracy and Pakistan.”
The former ruling party formally launched its anti-government campaign, set to reach its “peak” by August 5, following a high-level huddle in Lahore earlier this month.
Among other objectives, the protest movement is aimed at securing release of party founder Imran Khan, who will complete two years in jail on August 5.
The Imran Khan-founded party’s latest round of anti-government drive comes months after its negotiations with the government stalled over the issue of the formation of judicial commission to probe the May 9 riots and November 2024 Islamabad protest.-Agencies
