Last update: 03 May 2023, 05:18 IST
Imran Khan was ousted in a vote of no confidence in which members of his party were bribed to switch sides and vote against him. (AP Photo/KM Chaudary)
Khan has filed a petition with the LHC asking it to quash the 121 cases registered against him in different cities across the country on various charges
Former Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan told the Lahore High Court (LHC) on Tuesday that a third assassination attempt had been hatched against him and sought to have all political charges against him dropped, saying appearances regular appearances in court would put his life in danger.
Khan filed a petition with the LHC asking it to quash the 121 cases registered against him in different cities across the country for various charges like treason, blasphemy, commission and incitement to violence and terrorism.
According to the petition, the lawsuits were brought for political reasons.
Khan, 71, appeared outside the LHC under tight security. During the hearing, he asked the court to allow him to speak.
The court granted his request.
Khan, Pakistan’s Tehreek-e-Insaf: party chairman told the court that his life was in danger.
“Regular court appearances will put my life in danger. I survived two assassination attempts on my life – one in Wazirabad, Punjab, and the other at Islamabad Judicial Complex in Islamabad, where ISI had taken over the building,” said a court official at PTI, citing Khan.
“They (a reference to the powers that be) want to kill me and a third assassination attempt is in sight,” Khan told the court.
He said that in 70 years of his life there has not been a single case against him and all of these cases were filed after he was ousted as prime minister in April last year.
The official said the five-member LHC bench headed by Judge Ali Baqar Najafi ordered Khan to join police investigations into the cases on May 5.
“The court has not granted Khan’s request to appear before the police investigation via video link. However, the court will resume hearing on May 8,” the official said.
Earlier, Khan claimed he had identified a total of “six people” in the country in a video who wanted to kill him.
“Of the six, three are those I had named in the FIR after an assassination attempt on my life in Punjab in November last year,” Khan said on Thursday.
After the November 3 shooting attack on his gathering in the Wazirabad area (about 150 km from Lahore) in which he was shot in the leg, Khan accused Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, Interior Minister Rana Sanaullah and Major General Faisal Naseer of hatching a plot to assassinate him.
“Minister of Home Affairs (Sanaullah) says my life is threatened by foreign agencies. Let me make it clear to the whole country that the only threat to my life comes from the 3 people I named after the assassination attempt in Wazirabad. The same 3, + 3 others I identified in a video statement, attempted to eliminate me on March 18 in the ICT court complex,” Khan said in a series of tweets.
“If an attempt is made now on my life, these same people will be responsible. Just as they tried to blame the Wazirabad attack on a religious extremist – a mere smokescreen – they are now trying to create another deception of foreign agencies,” he said.
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(This story has not been edited by News18 staff and is published from a syndicated news agency feed)
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