Pakistani court sentences ex-prime minister Imran Khan to 14 years in prison
Khan had previously been convicted on charges of corruption, revealing official secrets and violating marriage laws. (Reuters: Akhtar Soomro)
In short:
A Pakistani court has sentenced the country's former prime minister Imran Khan to 14 years in jail after finding him guilty of corruption.
His wife was also sentenced to seven years in the same case.
What's next?
Khan is already imprisoned and will serve his sentences concurrently, meaning he only serves the length of the longest sentence.
A Pakistani court on Friday sentenced the country's already-imprisoned former prime minister Imran Khan to 14 years in jail after finding him guilty of corruption, officials and his lawyer said.
His wife Bushra Bibi was also sentenced to seven years in the same landmark graft case.
It convicted him along with his wife over a welfare foundation they established together called the Al-Qadir Trust.
Faith healer Bibi — who was recently released on bail — was arrested at the court after the conviction, her spokeswoman Mashal Yousafzai said.
The couple are accused of accepting a gift of land from a real estate tycoon in exchange for laundered money when Khan was in power.
Prosecutors say the businessman, Malik Riaz, was then allowed by Khan to pay fines that were imposed on him in another case from the same laundered money of 190 million British pounds ($373 million) that was returned to Pakistan by British authorities in 2022 to deposit to the national exchequer.
Khan and Bibi had pleaded not guilty.
Khan's Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party says the land was not for personal gain and was for the spiritual and educational institution the former prime minister had set up.
"Whilst we wait for a detailed decision, it's important to note that the Al Qadir Trust case against Imran Khan and Bushra Bibi lacks any solid foundation and is bound to collapse," PTI's foreign media wing said in a statement.
Law Minister Azam Nazeer Tarar told reporters that Khan's party could reach out to higher courts to appeal against the ruling, and that the former cricket star could also file a mercy petition to the president of Pakistan.
Omar Ayub, an aide of Khan, said the party would challenge the verdict in higher courts.
"I will neither make any deal nor seek any relief," Khan said after his conviction.
Legal action 'intended to disqualify' Khan from office, UN says
Pakistan's former prime minister Imran Khan and his wife Bushra Bibi. (AP: K.M. Chaudary)
The verdict in the case was delivered by an anti-graft court in a prison in the garrison city of Rawalpindi, where Khan has been jailed since August 2023.
The announcement of the verdict was delayed three times, most recently on Monday, amid reconciliation talks between PTI and the government. The two sides have been at loggerheads since Khan was ousted from office in 2022.
While imprisoned, Khan has been facing dozens of cases ranging from charges of graft and misuse of power to inciting violence against the state after being removed from office in a parliamentary vote of confidence in April 2022.
He has either been acquitted or his sentences suspended in most cases, except for this one and another on charges of inciting supporters to rampage through military facilities to protest against his arrest on May 9, 2023.
His supporters have led several violent protest rallies since the May 9 incidents.
Khan has denied wrongdoing and insisted since his arrest in 2023 that all the charges against him are a plot by rivals to keep him from returning to office.
He was barred from standing in February's election and his PTI party were hamstrung by a widespread crackdown.
PTI won more seats than any other party in the poll, but a coalition of parties considered more pliable to the influence of the military establishment shut them out of power.
A UN panel of experts found last year that Khan's detention "had no legal basis and appears to have been intended to disqualify him from running for political office".
Khan has previously been convicted on charges of corruption, revealing official secrets and violating marriage laws in three separate verdicts and sentenced to 10, 14 and seven years respectively.
Under Pakistani law, he is to serve the terms concurrently — meaning he only serves the length of the longest of the sentences.
ABC/Wires