Pakistan's Imran Khan arrested in corruption case

Former Pakistani prime minister Imran Khan was taken into custody on Tuesday after he had appeared in court in Islamabad in connection with a corruption case.

Mr Khan was taken by a paramilitary force from outside the Islamabad High Court.

“Imran Khan's car has been surrounded,” his aide Fawad Chaudhry said.

Mr Khan was dragged out of the court and into a police vehicle, said Mr Chaudhry. He said the former prime minister was in the custody of the security forces and denounced the arrest as “an abduction.”

Pakistan’s independent GEO TV broadcast images of Mr Khan being pulled by security forces towards an armoured vehicle, which took him away.

It is not yet known where Mr Khan has been taken.

A scuffle broke out afterwards between Mr Khan’s supporters and police.

Mr Chaudhry said some of Mr Khan's lawyers and supporters, as well as several police officers, were injured in the fight.

Police in Lahore, the city where he lives, have put out a high alert following the arrest.

Mr Khan's party immediately complained to the Islamabad High Court, which requested a police report explaining the charges for his arrest.

Officials from the anti-corruption body said that Pakistan’s National Accountability Bureau had issued arrest warrants for Mr Khan last week in a separate case, for which he had not obtained bail, which would have protected him from arrest under the country's laws.

The officials told the Associated Press that Mr Khan would appear before an anti-corruption tribunal later on Tuesday.

He arrived in Islamabad earlier in the day from nearby Lahore to face charges before the Islamabad High Court.

He has claimed that the string of cases against him, which include terrorism charges, are a plot by Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif's government to discredit him.

Mr Khan, a former cricket star turned Islamist politician, is facing hundreds of charges.

Anticipating his arrest, party officials later released a pre-recorded video of Mr Khan in which he urged supporters to come out in support of “true freedom”.

“My Pakistanis, by the time these words reach you I would have been detained under an illegitimate case,” he said in the video.

“One thing that should become clear for all of you from this is that fundamental rights in Pakistan, the rights given to us by our constitution and democracy, have been buried.”

The country is expected to hold national elections later this year.

Mr Khan is pushing for early elections after he was ousted in April 2022 in a no-confidence vote.

Emboldened by strong support in opinion polls and rallies, Mr Khan has shown no signs of backing down against the government and the army and is seeking support from the Supreme Court to hold polls in two provinces for a start.

Earlier, Pakistan’s army criticised Mr Khan for accusing one of their senior officials of orchestrating assassination attempts against him and challenged him to address the matter in court.

Mr Khan, 70, held Mr Sharif, Interior Minister Rana Sanaullah and senior military officials responsible for a shooting incident at a rally last year in which his leg was injured. They have denied involvement.

He used a rally at the weekend to accuse the military of being behind at least two attempts to murder him, focusing on the alleged involvement of a senior official from the Inter-Service Intelligence, or ISI, which oversees Pakistan’s internal security.

“These fabricated and malicious allegations are extremely unfortunate, deplorable and unacceptable,” the military said in a rare statement directed at Mr Khan late on Monday.

“This has been a consistent pattern for the last one year, wherein military and intelligence agencies officials are targeted with insinuations and sensational propaganda for the furtherance of political objectives.”

It asked for the allegations to be addressed in court.