Leaked doc implies US involvement in Imran Khan’s ouster: Report

The United States could have influenced the no-confidence movement towards former Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan in 2022 as a consequence of his impartial stance on the Russian invasion of Ukraine, in keeping with a leaked Pakistani authorities doc obtained by The Intercept.

The categorized Pakistani doc describes what occurred in a gathering involving the Pakistani ambassador to the US, Asad Majeed Khan, and two US State Department officers, together with Donald Lu, on March 7, 2022, as per the report by The Intercept.

A day after the assembly, a no-confidence movement was fielded towards Imran Khan on March 8, 2022. Then, on April 10, Khan was ousted from energy.

WHAT WAS IN THE LEAKED DOCUMENT?

The US’ Assistant Secretary of State for the Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs, Donald Lu, criticised Pakistan’s impartial place on Ukraine, in keeping with the doc obtained by The Intercept.

The doc confirmed that he had hinted at a no-confidence vote to rectify the scenario in the course of the assembly with the then Pakistani ambassador to the US.

As per the doc, Lu mentioned, “People here and in Europe are quite concerned about why Pakistan is taking such an aggressively neutral position (on Ukraine), if such a position is even possible. It does not seem such a neutral stand to us.”

He then went on to say that if the Prime Minister was changed, “all would be forgiven in Washington,” in keeping with The Intercept’s report.

“I think if the no-confidence vote against the Prime Minister succeeds, all will be forgiven in Washington because the Russia visit is being looked at as a decision by the Prime Minister,” Lu said, reported The Intercept, quoting the leaked document.

According to The Intercept, the document showed that the talk ended with the Pakistani ambassador saying he hoped the Russia-Ukraine war wouldn’t hurt Pakistan’s relationship with the US.

“I would argue that it has already created a dent in the relationship from our perspective,” Lu said.

“Let us wait for a few days to see whether the political situation changes, which would mean that we would not have a big disagreement about this issue and the dent would go away very quickly,” the US State Department official mentioned, as quoted by the doc obtained by The Intercept.

In response to the accusations towards the US for its alleged position in Imran Khan’s ouster, Mathew Miller, the State Department spokesperson, mentioned that the allegations have been false.

“We had expressed concern concerning the go to of then-PM Khan to Moscow on the day of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and have communicated that opposition each publicly and privately,” he said, as quoted by The Intercept.

IMRAN KHAN’S ALLEGATIONS AGAINST THE US

On March 27, 2022, Khan, who is in jail after being convicted in a corruption case, had alleged that “overseas forces”, which he later said was “Washington”, had orchestrated a plan to oust him from office and brandished the cypher or the classified diplomatic document at a public rally to back his claims.

In July this year, Pakistan’s Federal Minister, Khawaja Asif, said that the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf chief used a “diplomatic cypher for political functions and he might be charged with treason for utilizing the Pakistan authorities’s categorized doc for vested pursuits”.

Khan might be dealing with prices of treason within the Cypher case, he added.

Published On:

Aug 10, 2023