https://arab.news/cu8zf
- Islamabad High Court directs ex-PM Imran Khan to submit written response again
- Khan is accused of threatening a judge in a speech delivered earlier this month
ISLAMABAD: The Islamabad High Court (IHC) directed former Prime Minister Imran Khan on Wednesday to submit his written response in a contempt of court case within seven days, adjourning proceedings till September 8.
The IHC issued a show-cause notice to the former premier last week after he allegedly threatened a judge at an Islamabad rally on August 20. Khan severely criticized female judge Zeba Chaudhry and senior police officials for detaining his chief of staff, Dr. Shahbaz Gill. Khan and Gill both claim he was subjected to physical and mental torture in police custody and was sexually abused as well.
A police report of the rally quoted Khan as saying he “would not spare” Islamabad’s police chief and the judge. “The purpose of the speech was to spread terror among the police and the judiciary and prevent them from doing their duty,” police said in the report, as they also booked him under anti-terrorism laws.
Khan arrived at the high court, where security was beefed up with the heavy deployment of police officials and roads outside the court cordoned off with barbed wires. The PTI chairman entered the court with his lawyers and aides Faisal Javed Khan and ex-foreign minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi by his side.
The ex-PM, who came into power in 2018 and was ousted in April in a no-confidence vote in parliament, could be disqualified for life from politics if convicted of insulting Chaudhry.
Khan and his Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party have denied the charges, saying that cases against the ex-PM are politically motivated. In a response to the high court’s show-cause notice on Tuesday, Khan said his words at the rally “were uttered spontaneously without any previous motive and malice only to emphasize that the rule of law should be strictly followed in the matter of Shahbaz Gill by the authorities.”
The ex-prime minister did not apologize to the court but added that he was willing to take back his words if they were deemed inappropriate. “The respondent submits with humility that if words he uttered are regarded as inappropriate, he is willing to take them back,” he said.
In an interview to a private TV channel on Tuesday, PTI leader and Khan’s aide, Chaudhry Fawad Hussain, lamented how everyone was focusing on Khan’s remarks against the judge but not on Gill’s “custodial torture.”
“In his petition, Khan has spoken about the context of his words,” Hussain said. “He said that the context to his speech was that the female judge had issued Gill’s remand despite her knowledge of the medical fact that Shahbaz Gill had been tortured,” he added.
Khan has accused Washington of conspiring with his political rivals to oust him from office via the parliamentary vote, a charge both Washington and Pakistan’s government have rejected. The ex-premier has refused to recognize Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s government and has demanded early polls. Sharif, on the other hand, has said elections will be held next year as per schedule.