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Tag: Imran Khan
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Pakistan’s media watchdog bars TV channels from airing Imran Khan’s speeches
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Pakistan’s electronic media watchdog on Saturday prohibited television channels from broadcasting or rebroadcasting ousted premier Imran Khan’s speeches or media talks, saying airing such content would likely to create hatred among the people and endanger national security.
The Pakistan Electronic Media and Regulatory Authority (PEMRA) warned that it will suspend the broadcasting licence in case of any violation.
“In case of any violation, the observed licence may be suspended without any show-cause notice in the public interest along with other enabling provisions of law,” it said in a notification.
It also said that Khan during his long march speeches and a day ago in an address from hospital “made aspersions against the state institutions by levelling baseless allegations for orchestrating an assassination plan”.
The media watchdog said that airing such content violated several laws and was likely to create “hatred among the people” or was prejudicial to the maintenance of law and order or was likely to disturb public peace and tranquillity or endanger national security.
Khan, 70, suffered a bullet injury in the right leg when two gunmen fired a volley of bullets at him in the Wazirabad area of Punjab province on Thursday, where he was leading a protest march against the Shehbaz Sharif government.
Khan, the chairman of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party, alleged in his address to the nation on Friday from hospital that Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, Interior Minister Rana Sanaullah and Major General Faisal Naseer were part of a sinister plot to assassinate him in the same way as former Punjab governor Salman Taseer was killed in 2011 by a religious extremist.
Prime Minister Shehbaz demanded Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Umar Ata Bandial constitute a “full court commission” to probe the allegations levelled by Khan.
He said Khan is a “liar from head to toe” and is trying his best to destroy Pakistan.
The Pakistan Army has also dismissed the ousted premier’s remarks as “absolutely unacceptable”.
“The baseless allegations hurled at the institution/officials today are highly regrettable and strongly condemned,” it said.
This is the second time that PEMRA took action against the airing of Khan’s speeches.
In August, the same regulator had imposed a ban on broadcasting Khan’s live speeches on all satellite TV channels with immediate effect.
However, in September, the Islamabad High Court (IHC) overturned the ban.
Since he was ousted from power in April, the cricketer-turned politician has repeatedly claimed that the no-trust motion against him was the result of a “foreign conspiracy”.
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Former Pakistan PM Imran Khan shot and wounded at protest march
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Pakistan’s former prime minister Imran Khan (R) addresses his supporters during an anti-government march towards capital Islamabad, demanding early elections, in Gujranwala on November 1, 2022.
Arif Ali | AFP | Getty Images
Pakistan’s former Prime Minister Imran Khan on Thursday was shot and wounded while leading a massive protest march in the country’s eastern city of Wazirabad.
Mohammad Atif Khan, a close aide of the former PM and senior leader in his Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party, said Khan was shot in the leg and taken to hospital. Another PTI leader, Faisal Khan, was also injured, Atif Khan told NBC.
He said that two armed men opened fire and were immediately taken into custody by police. He also said that one of the assailants was beaten by the mob and reportedly died, according to NBC. An as-yet-unknown number of Imran Khan’s supporters who were present at the rally were also reportedly injured.
The PTI party called the shooting an “assassination attempt” in a tweet posted shortly after Khan was taken for treatment. Senior PTI member and former information minister Fawad Ahmed Chaudhry said in an impromptu speech following the shooting: “This is not only an assassination attempt on Imran Khan, but attack on Pakistan itself.”
Within an hour of the shooting, videos were being shared on social media which appeared to show Khan standing up with one bandaged leg and waving to supporters, holding one fist in the air.
Ousted Pakistan’s prime minister Imran Khan (C) waves at his party supporters during a rally in Islamabad on May 26, 2022.
Aamir Qureshi | Afp | Getty Images
The protest on Thursday was part of a week-long tour aimed at drumming up support for toppling the current government of opponent Shehbaz Sharif and forcing early elections.
The 70-year-old Khan, a former cricket star who became Pakistan’s prime minister in 2018, was ousted from power in April of this year after a no-confidence vote by opposition lawmakers alleging corruption and unconstitutional actions, charges backed up by the country’s Supreme Court.
In October, Pakistan’s election commission passed a ruling barring Khan from holding office again, sparking outrage among his many supporters who claim foul play.
Khan and his supporters say his ousting was a conspiracy planned by current Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and the United States, the latter of which has a long and complicated relationship with the Pakistani government. Sharif and Washington deny the accusations.
Floods, inflation and anger
In the months since his removal from office, Khan has soared in popularity among Pakistanis, many of whom across the country of 225 million are struggling given rising inflation and living costs.
Pakistan was plunged into greater turmoil after floods in June caused by abnormally heavy monsoon rains and melting glaciers engulfed some 30% of the country, killing nearly 2,000 people and potentially pushing as many as 9 million into poverty, according to the World Bank.
Khan, the former cricket captain, is seen by many in and around Pakistan as something of a common man’s hero. He is openly critical of the United States — a major military aid provider — and Pakistan’s own powerful military, which has been responsible for leadership coups in the past.
“For six months I have been witnessing a revolution taking over the country,” Khan wrote on Monday, describing the crowds of protesters supporting him. “Only question is will it be a soft one through the ballot box or a destructive one through bloodshed?”
Khan’s legal troubles only seem to have made him more popular among his base, who believe he will make a comeback and become prime minister again in elections that would be held by next year. Some political analysts see him as a likely favorite as well, and many expect the charges against him to be dropped.
Khan is one of the most famous figures in Pakistan and the wider South Asian region, known for leading Pakistan’s national cricket team to glory in the 1980s and 90s. He later transitioned to politics, founding the PTI in 1996.
Khan’s political career was marked by losses until his party, running on a populist platform, won the most seats in Pakistan’s National Assembly in 2018 and he led the governing coalition as prime minister.
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‘I see his speeches’: UAE minister praises EAM Jaishankar, says impressed by his abilities
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After Imran Khan, a UAE minister has praised India’s External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar for deftly defending New Delhi’s foreign policy, without taking any side despite pressures from the West. UAE’s Minister of State for Artificial Intelligence Omar Sultan Al Olama on Wednesday said he was impressed by Jaishankar’s ability to project India’s foreign policy globally.
Speaking at an event, Olama said historically, the world was unipolar, bipolar, or tripolar, where one had to choose sides. “I am very impressed by your Minister of Foreign Affairs. I see some of his speeches. One thing is very clear for both the UAE and India, which is we don’t need to choose sides,” he was quoted as saying by the news agency IANS.
Olama is the second foreign minister to publicly praise Jaishankar. Earlier, former Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan praised India’s foreign minister for not giving in to the West’s pressure to not buy discounted oil from Russia.
Khan even played a clip of Jaishankar’s response to a question on whether India was funding Russia’s war in Ukraine by buying oil from Moscow. To that question, Jaishankar had said that India’s total import of oil from Moscow in a month was probably less than what Europe bought in an afternoon. His response had gone viral on social media, and Imran Khand played that video during a rally in Lahore to target the Shehbaz Sharif government in Pakistan.
After Russia attacked Ukraine, the Western countries and European Union imposed heavy sanctions on Moscow. However, they kept the energy out as Europe is highly dependent on Russian gas. Hit by sanctions, Russia offered discounted oil to India, which accepted the offer as crude prices were shooting up and inflation was getting out of control.
Jaishankar’s one more response created a huge buzz when he reminded the world what the West had done in Afghanistan. During an event in April, Jaishankar was told that Russia attacked Ukraine because it was a democracy, and everything Moscow was doing in the former Soviet republic was against international law.
To this, the EAM said there are equally pressing issues in other parts of the world. He mentioned Afghanistan and the challenges in Asia. Jaishankar said when the rules-based based order was under challenge in Asia, the advice from Europe was – “do more trade”. “At least we are not giving that advice,” he said.
Jaishankar then mentioned Afghanistan and asked which part of the rules-based order justified what the world did there.
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Pakistan election commission disqualifies former PM Imran Khan
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Former prime minister disqualified from being a member of parliament over ‘corrupt practices’.
Islamabad, Pakistan – Pakistan’s election commission, in a unanimous decision, has found former Prime Minister Imran Khan guilty of “corrupt practices” and disqualified him from being a member of parliament.
Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party immediately rejected Friday verdict. It said it would file an appeal to the Islamabad High Court to challenge the verdict and called on supporters to take to the streets.
The case against Khan was filed in August by a member of the Pakistan Muslim Nawaz, contending that the former prime minister had bought gifts given from foreign dignitaries from the state gift depository (also called Toshakhana) but did not disclose the assets in the declarations submitted to the commission.
More to follow…
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