Imran Khan Sentenced To 10 Years In State Secrets Case, Lawyer Decries 'Illegal' Court Decision

Former Pakistani prime minister Imran Khan and ex-foreign minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi have each been sentenced to 10 years in prison in a case that revolves around the alleged leaking of state documents.

Judge Abul Hasnat Zulqarnain, presiding over a special court in Rawalpindi, Pakistan, announced the decision Tuesday.

Imran Khan's lawyer, Naeem Panjutha, took to X (formerly Twitter) to express his dismay over the court's decision. "We don't accept this illegal decision," he said in a Google-translated statement. He said Khan's "only" wrongdoing was he "stood up against this mafia."

In the case, Khan is accused of misusing a diplomatic cable by publicly disclosing the contents of a state cipher supposedly sent by Pakistan's ambassador in Washington to Islamabad.

Late in March 2022, Khan waved a document before a crowd during a public rally, claiming that the document was a cable from a foreign country that conspired with his political rivals to oust him. At the time, he did not mention the country where the cable came from.

However, he said days later that the U.S. was conspiring with his rivals, specifically naming American diplomat Donald Lu as allegedly having sought to overthrow him, as per local Geo News.

Khan has claimed the cable was evidence that the Pakistani military and the White House sought to topple his government following his Moscow visit shortly before Russia invaded Ukraine. He was ousted in a no-confidence vote in April 2022.

Both the U.S. and Pakistan's military have denied Khan's claims.

Khan, who founded the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party, pled not guilty to the alleged misuse of the diplomatic cable for political purposes, as per Pakistani media. Before news of the court's decision broke, Khan said in a statement that he was already aware of the case's outcome. He urged Pakistanis to remain "peaceful" when they vote next month, saying the election day "will be our day of victory."

The former Pakistani PM has also been barred from participating in the upcoming elections, scheduled for Feb. 8. He and the PTI party have been "almost erased" from the election campaign, as the party's candidates are not on electoral posters nationwide.

The decade-long sentence is separate from the three-year jail term on Khan over a corruption case following his ousting from the prime minister's office in 2022. The said sentence was suspended as he appealed the conviction.

He is faced with dozens of other cases since his ouster in a parliamentary vote of no confidence.