The Interview – ‘I am isolated because all my top leadership was arrested’: Pakistan’s Imran Khan
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Pakistan’s former prime minister and PTI party leader Imran Khan was released on bail on May 12 after being arrested on graft charges. Since then, he says he has been “isolated” at his home, cut off from the senior leadership of his party, while thousands of his supporters have been arrested. “Anyone who supports PTI is either arrested or has gone underground,” he told FRANCE 24 from his home in Lahore.
Dozens of Khan’s supporters who are suspected of attacking army installations during protests that followed his arrest have been handed over to the Pakistani military for trials. This “new tactic (…) of military courts basically means the end of our democracy,” Khan said. He denounced an “unprecedented crackdown” by a government “desperate to dismantle” his party, comparing it to Adolf Hitler using the 1933 fire of the Reichstag in Berlin to go after his enemies.
Khan said he had offered to form a committee to dialogue with the authorities and that he was ready to step aside if this could help. But he offered little hope that this would succeed. After demanding early elections for months, he indicated that he was now willing to accept that federal elections be held as scheduled in October. However, he added that he doubted the ruling majority would hold them, out of concern that his party would triumph.
Khan said he still fears for his life after two assassination attempts. “I am not at all safe,” he told FRANCE 24.
>> Read more: Pakistan’s top court declares arrest of ex-PM Imran Khan ‘invalid’
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