Pakistan's PTI launches 'Free Imran Khan' movement for ex-PM's release from jail

Former Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan's party — the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) — has informally kick-started the 'Free Imran Khan Movement' from Lahore. The movement has been launched to demand the release of the incarcerated former prime minister, with police making several arrests to prevent party workers from joining the protest, the party said on July 13.

The informal launch comes less than a month ahead of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI)'s previously announced date of August 5.

Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Chief Minister and prominent PTI leader Ali Amin Gandapur reached Lahore late on Saturday night, along with other party leaders, to declare the launch of the movement to free Khan, the patron-in-chief of the party.

The 72-year-old cricketer-turned-politician has been behind bars since August 2023 after he was booked in multiple cases.

The PTI is gearing up to launch a massive drive from August 5 across the country to press the Shehbaz Sharif government and military establishment to free Khan.

Gandapur and other main leaders of the party are camping in a farmhouse in Lahore's Raiwind area, adjacent to the Sharif family residence, in the city to give a final shape to their protest campaign.

Meanwhile, police reportedly arrested at least 20 PTI workers who gathered to welcome their leaders at different points in Lahore.

A PTI spokesperson said on Sunday that the Punjab police have detained its several workers. "The police have been raiding the party leaders and workers' residences in the Punjab province, especially Lahore, for the last couple of days to stop them from taking part in the protest activities," he said.

A Punjab police spokesperson denied the arrest of any of Khan's party workers.

However, a police source told Press Trust of India that at least 20 PTI workers have been picked up in Lahore and elsewhere.

Speaking to the party leaders in Lahore, Gandapur said, "Any protest campaign launched from Lahore earns success and this too will be successful across the country."

He asked the party leaders and workers to take the protest campaign to its peak by August 5.

"The military establishment has been ruling Pakistan for decades and imposed multiple martial laws as part of different experiments, destroying the country. This time the military has imposed a new kind of martial law, which is not official, but wielding every kind of power and pressure.

"It has destroyed the country but the perpetrators are not even showing any remorse," Gandapur said and added though the PTI leaders and workers are facing thousands of FIRs, the party is all set to launch a massive protest campaign aimed at the release of Imran Khan, his wife and all other leaders.

PTI interim chairman Barrister Gohar Ali Khan said the Punjab government has been unleashing fascism on his party men and women for the past two years. "Hopefully better sense will prevail and the Maryam Nawaz government will act with sanity," he said, referring to the provincial government chief.

Meanwhile, Punjab province's Information Minister Azma Bokhari said Gandapur and his party are "champions of chaos."

She claimed Gandapur's own province was burning and he had come to Lahore to conquer Punjab. "Gandapur should better go back to KP and work for the welfare of the people of the province," she said.

Earlier on June 7, Rana Sanaullah, Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on Political Affairs, had said that Imran Khan's party was in no position to launch a protest movement in the country.

Sanaullah had urged the PTI to accept Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif's offer of a meeting for negotiations and sit with the government to make amendments to the election laws.

His comments had come two days after Gandapur threatened to launch a full-scale movement for Khan's release after Eid Al-Adha. The party had then postponed the movement to August 5.