Pakistan’s Ex-PM Imran Khan Urges on Protesters After Surviving Assassination Attempt

Pakistan's former prime minister Imran Khan addresses the media representatives at a hospital in Lahore on Nov. 4, 2022, a day after an assassination attempt on him. Arif Ali/AFP via Getty Images

Former Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan on Thursday called on his supporters to continue their “long march” to the capital Islamabad after recovering from a gunshot wound sustained during a rally last week.

In a video address, Khan vowed to continue his fight for “real freedom” and urged his supporters to remove blockades as his Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party resumed rally in Wazirabad—the same place where the shooting occurred.

“I will reach Rawalpindi and I invite you all to come and march with us because it is a matter of the future of the country and the future of your children,” he was quoted as saying by local media The Nation.

Khan Refutes Police Account

Khan was shot on Nov. 3 at a rally that he had led to press for snap polls since being ousted in a parliament vote in April. The attack resulted in one death, and Khan claimed that it was an “assassination attempt” by his rivals.

A police report released last week stated that a man identified as Mohammad Naveed acted alone in the shooting in Wazirabad. The suspected shooter was arrested after he was intercepted by a Khan supporter at the scene.

Khan refuted the police account, saying that at least two shooters executed the “planned” attack last week. He did not provide any supporting evidence but cited occasions when he spoke at rallies in September about a suspected plot.

Former Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan is helped after he was shot in the leg in Wazirabad, Pakistan, on Nov. 3, 2022, in this still image obtained from a video. Urdu Media via Reuters

Khan had accused Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, Interior Minister Rana Sanaullah, and Major General Faisal Naseer of plotting his murder and blaming it on a religious fanatic.

“On Sept. 24, I said in a public rally that this plan was formed and that they will blame a religious fanatic [for it],” he said in the video. “They planned that if a religious fanatic kills Imran, the responsibility from them will go away.”

The Pakistani government and the military have strongly denied the allegations. Sanaullah said the shooter was a “self-motivated and committed person” who carried out the attack on a religious basis.

Sharif said Wednesday that he had asked Pakistan’s chief judge to form judicial commissions to investigate the shooting attack on Khan and the murder of Pakistani journalist Arshad Sharif, who was shot dead in Kenya last month.

“These unfortunate incidents are being used to make false allegations, spread chaos [and] undermine institutions. Let [the] truth be determined,” the prime minister said in a tweet.

Reuters contributed to this report.