PTI presses for Imran's hospitalisation

ISLAMABAD:

On Friday, PTI leaders once again expressed serious concern over the health of jailed party founder and former prime minister Imran Khan and demanded his immediate treatment at Islamabad Shifa International Hospital.

Addressing the media, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) Chief Minister Sohail Afridi said the party made every possible constitutional and legal effort to ensure Imran receives treatment in the presence of his family and doctors, but their requests were not accepted.

"Imran Khan is not an ordinary individual; he is a former prime minister of Pakistan," Afridi said. The former PM has been detained at Rawalpindi's Adiala Jail since September 2023.

He criticised the government for lacking a clear economic policy and accused it of preventing Imran from receiving medical treatment and restricting his meetings with family members and doctors.

PTI leader Junaid Akbar said the current regional situation is tense and warned that increasing hostility between the public and state institutions could be dangerous.

"If Imran Khan's health condition is not serious, then why are his sisters not allowed to meet him?" he questioned.

Former federal law minister Babar Awan alleged that Imran Khan's illness had been concealed for nearly two and a half months, which he described as a criminal act.

He claimed that the delay in medical treatment caused severe damage to the former PM's eyesight.

"In the past, former prime minister Nawaz Sharif sought treatment abroad, but we are only demanding that Imran Khan be shifted to Shifa Hospital in Islamabad," he said.

PTI leader Shahid Khattak said the party has little confidence in the current medical arrangements and demanded that Imran Khan receive treatment at Shifa Hospital with access to his family and personal doctors.

Former provincial minister Taimur Saleem Jhagra also warned that the regional situation has become serious, referring to tensions involving Iran and Israel.

He stressed that providing proper medical treatment to Imran Khan in the presence of his family and doctors was his basic right.

Afridi concluded by saying that PTI's demands are constitutional and legal, adding that the party is looking to the courts for justice and that peaceful protest remains its constitutional right.

On Wednesday, a meeting of the joint opposition parliamentary party passed a unanimous resolution demanding the immediate release of jailed former prime minister Imran Khan.

The resolution expressed serious concern over Imran Khan's health condition, noting that he has reportedly been shifted twice for treatment to the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences due to a lack of adequate medical facilities in prison.

It also pointed out the absence of a retina specialist at the hospital and claimed that despite deterioration in the vision of his right eye, access to his personal physicians and family members remained restricted.

In view of his deteriorating health and the need for immediate medical attention, it demanded his immediate release under Rules 143, 145, 146, 197 and 795 of the Pakistan Prison Rules, read with Section 401 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, citing precedents where similar relief had been granted to a convicted former prime minister.