High security prison for ex-Pakistani PM Imran Khan after court sentencing

Pakistan’s former Prime Minister Imran Khan awoke yesterday as an inmate in a high-security prison after a court handed him a three-year jail sentence for corruption, a development that could end his future in politics.

The court ruled Saturday that national cricketing hero Khan, who was ousted in a no-confidence vote in April 2022 but remains the country’s leading opposition figure, had concealed assets after selling state gifts.

The prison sentence could bar him from politics under a law that prohibits people with a criminal conviction from holding or running for public office. He could also lose the chairmanship of the party he founded, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, or PTI.

Critics say efforts to put Khan behind bars are politically motivated and have intensified ahead of elections due to be held later this year.

They argue that Khan’s popularity and a large support base pose a threat to the ruling coalition and its backers in Pakistan’s powerful military that has been the final arbiter of the country’s politics since independence from Britain in 1947.