ISLAMABAD: The Islamabad High Court (IHC) reserved its judgment on incarcerated Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan’s petitions seeking post-arrest bail and quashing the cipher case against him.
The development came a day before a special court set up to try cases under the Official Secrets Act will indict the former prime minister — who was ousted from office in April 2022 through a vote of no-confidence — and PTI’s Vice Chairman Shah Mahmood Qureshi in the diplomatic cable case.
The special court had set October 17 as a date to frame charges against the duo in the case last week. Special court judge Abual Hasnat Muhammad Zulqarnain will resume hearing the case in Rawalpindi’s Adiala jail today (Tuesday).
On August 18, the ousted premier was booked under the Official Secrets Act 1923 in the cipher case after the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) invoked Section 5 of the said law. The diplomatic cable reportedly went missing from Khan’s possession. According to the former ruling party, the cable contained a threat from the US to topple the PTI’s government.
Imran Khan is currently in Adiala jail on judicial remand in the cipher case. He was taken into custody after being sentenced to three years in prison in the Toshakhana case on August 5, 2023. Initially, he was kept in Attock jail but later he was moved to Adiala jail on his request.
It is pertinent to mention here that the IHC on August 29 had suspended the sentence handed down to the PTI chairman in the Toshakhana case.
At the outset of today’s hearing, FIA’s special prosecutor said: “It is a case in which the suspect [Khan] confessed to his crime after committing it.”
Giving his arguments, the prosecutor said that the Official Secrets Act 2023 proposes a maximum punishment of 14 years in prison or the death penalty for making the secret documents public.
At this, Sardar Latif Khosa — Khan’s counsel — argued that his client did not make public the diplomatic cable, adding that Khan had symbolically waved just a paper in the air.
Days before his ouster from the government, then prime minister — on March 7, 2022 — had brandished a letter before the crowd at the Parade Ground in Islamabad, claiming that it was a cipher of what he had claimed contained “evidence” of a foreign conspiracy against his government.
The FIA prosecutor, however, argued that the cipher was a secret document and the information it contained could not be made public.
Read more: IHC to announce reserved verdict on jail trial of PTI chief in cipher case today
