Pakistan's top court orders release of former Prime Minister Imran Khan

In a major turn of events, Pakistan's Supreme Court on Thursday ordered the immediate release of former Prime Minister Imran Khan. The court declared his arrest on corruption charges just two days prior was unlawful. Khan is a political opposition leader in Pakistan. He remains hugely popular in the country of 230 million, despite being forced out of office with a no confidence vote last year. Khan's arrest sparked violent riots and protests in major cities in the country. At least eight people were killed and dozens injured during demonstrations. More than 1500 of Khan's supporters were arrested.

For more on this, I'm joined by Madia Afsal. She is a fellow in the foreign policy program at the Brookings Institution. Madia, before we get to the fortunes of the former prime minister, can you help us understand the context of what's happening in Pakistan? There are elections in October, the economy's in turmoil, so set the scene for us, if you would. Sure. This really is about a power struggle, a political power struggle between Mr. Imran Khan on the one hand and the military establishment on the other and the incumbent government. But the incumbent government is less important to this power struggle than the military versus Mr.

Khan. And this has really become sort of existential for both of them, kind of a zero-sum struggle, if you will. At the same time, Pakistan has been struggling with an economic crisis that comes around every few years, but is exacerbated this time around partly because of the political crisis. It had a flooding emergency last year. So the country is really in sort of dire straits with sort of a multiple set of crises, but the political crisis takes sort of precedence over everything else. Let me understand a little bit more about that conflict with the military. Describe for people the unique relationship between leaders in Pakistan and the military, and also it's not just a war of words, right? I mean, his supporters, Khan supporters are actually taking action against military facilities.

Right. So the military is the most powerful institution in Pakistan. This has been true through both civilian governments as well as, of course, during military, direct military rule. And while political parties bicker and sort of fall out of favor with the military, the military sort of reigns supreme even through civilian governments. The idea is that essentially, if you fall out of favor with the military in Pakistan, you will not be in power anymore. And that's essentially what happened with Mr. Khan.

So he fell out of favor with senior leaders in the military, and that's when he was voted out via a vote of no confidence last year. But he has sort of defied the usual playbook for the military in the sense that, you know, once a political leader is sidelined in Pakistan, they find it very difficult to come back to power. But Mr. Khan, you know, has rallied popular support in the last year, you know, won by elections, and, you know, has evaded arrest, evaded, you know, all the cases against him so far. And it's this popular support that has been able to give him this kind of buffer against the military. That kind of ended, of course, this week with his, you know, the manner of the arrest with, you know, paramilitary forces, dozens of them taking him basically in a car from the premises of the Islamabad High Court. But the Supreme Court's ruling today, declaring at least that arrest unlawful, gives Mr.

Khan some temporary relief and at least a temporary victory against the establishment. And Medea, how should we understand those Supreme Court's role in this? Was that a sign that civil institutions are working in this instance, or is there some other way to interpret that? Well, you know, the Supreme Court in Pakistan has been very active. You know, this is an active judiciary. It's been active since last year, since, and before, but in particular, after the no confidence vote with Mr. Khan. And the Chief Justice was careful in selecting this bench. There was a three-member bench of the Supreme Court.

And he selected one, at least one member who is not necessarily known to be sympathetic to Mr. Khan. And so that really lends the ruling credibility. This ruling also has precedence. The fact of the matter is that, you know, no one can be arrested lawfully from the premises of a court, as Mr. Khan was on Tuesday. And so that's what the Supreme Court currently has declared unlawful.

He's, Mr. Khan is to appear in court tomorrow again. So, you know, the corruption proceedings can continue against him, but it's sort of what happened on Tuesday that's been declared unlawful. And that's correctly so. Right. Medea Afzal, this was incredibly informative. Thank you, fellow in the foreign policy program at the Brookings Institution.

Thanks so much. Thanks for having me.

Pakistan, Imran Khan