Former Prime Minister Imran Khan and his close aide, former Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi, have been sentenced to 10 years in jail for allegedly leaking state secrets.
The jail terms were announced at a special court set up in a prison in Rawalpindi on Tuesday, January 30, 2024.
It comes as the country prepares to vote on February 8, 2024.
“Former prime minister Imran Khan and PTI (Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf) vice president (Shah Mahmood) Qureshi have been sentenced to 10 years each inside prison in the cipher case,” a spokesman for the party told the Associated Press.
The case revolves around how the two handled a “cipher” delivered by Pakistan’s ambassador to the United States, which claimed Washington was involved in a plot to remove Khan from office in 2022.
Khan, who was overthrown as Prime Minister by his opponents in 2022, is already serving a three-year prison sentence after being convicted of corruption.
He has claimed that all of the charges brought against him are politically motivated.
The conviction under the Secrets Act comes only a week before the general election, in which he is forbidden from standing.
Lawyer Abdul Moiz Jaferii said the sentencing required there should be a “deliberate and wilful” leaking of state secrets in collusion with an enemy, with the understanding that it would be detrimental to the state.
“I can’t wait to see how the trial court squares this circle. And who the enemy is with which Khan and Qureshi wanted to collude?” he told Al Jazeera.
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