ISLAMABAD (AP) — Pakistan’s Supreme Court on Wednesday rejected a petition from former Prime Minister Imran Khan about halting his trial in a lingering case involving the concealment of assets after selling state gifts, officials said.
The latest court ruling was a blow to Khan, who was disqualified by the Election Commission in October 2022 on charges he didn’t correctly disclose his assets after selling state gifts that he had received from foreign dignitaries and heads of state after coming to power in 2018.
Under last year’s ruling by the country’s election oversight body, Khan also lost his seat in the National Assembly in the graft case. Since then, Khan has been fighting a legal battle to avoid conviction in the case by the trial court.
Khan’s trial in the case will resume on Thursday at a court in the capital, Islamabad.
Khan has insisted he didn’t buy or sell state gifts in violation of the rules. In Pakistan, government leaders are allowed to buy back gifts, but they aren’t usually sold. If they are, individuals must declare that as income.
The latest development comes a day after the election oversight body decided to indict Khan on Aug. 2 on charges of publicly insulting its officials last year. Khan is accused of calling the head of the electoral body, Sikandar Sultan Rajaa, and several of its officials “personal servants” to Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif at several gatherings before he was disqualified by the Election Commission of Pakistan in the graft case.
Sharif replaced Khan in April 2022 after he was ousted from power in a no-confidence vote in parliament.
Khan has said that his ouster was part of a U.S. plot, a claim which has been denied by Sharif and Washington.
Legal challenges for Khan have grown in recent months, deepening political turmoil before the next parliamentary election due to be held in October or November at the completion of the current parliament’s five-year term.
Sharif has said he will step down next month to pave the way for the vote.
Khan is facing more than 150 legal cases, including several on charges of corruption, “terrorism” and inciting people to violence over deadly protests in May that saw his followers attack government and military property across the country.
Violence erupted across Pakistan in May when police arrested Khan in a separate graft case from a courtroom in Islamabad. Khan, a cricket star turned Islamist politician, still has a huge grassroots following in Pakistan. The days of rioting by his followers subsided only after Khan was released on an order from the Supreme Court.
Since then, several other courts have also given Khan protection from arrest in multiple cases.
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