Thousands of protesters in Pakistan defied a security crackdown on a march to Islamabad. At least one police officer was killed and dozens of people injured as supporters of jailed former Prime Minister Imran Khan clashed with security forces outside Pakistan’s capital Islamabad, according to officials and the PTI (Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf) Party.

Authorities have enforced a security lockdown for the last two days after Khan called for a march on parliament for a sit-in demonstration to demand his release, while highways into the city have been barricaded. Voted out of power by parliament in 2022 after he fell out with Pakistan’s powerful military, Khan faces charges ranging from corruption to instigation of violence, all of which he and his party deny.

Why do people think Imran Khan can save the country’s future? This time on News Desk, we ask: Imran Khan: Hope or Hype? Why are Pakistanis protesting for him?

In an exclusive interview with DW Editor-in-Chief Ines Pohl, Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan talks about Pakistan’s relationship to India, the Iran crisis and the international community’s “lukewarm” response to the Kashmir dispute.

by Rosamond Hutt

Pakistan hit its billion tree goal in August 2017 – months ahead of schedule. Now, the hills of the country’s northwestern province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa are alive with newly planted saplings.

The massive reforestation project – named the Billion Tree Tsunami – added 350,000 hectares of trees both by planting and natural regeneration, in an effort to restore the province’s depleted forests and fight the effects of climate change.

Imran Khan interview with George Negus

A remarkably frank interview filmed at Imran Khan’s home in Lahore.

by Caroline Davies – BBC News Islamabad

It was a surreal moment. On Tuesday night during his live TV show, Pakistani anchor Kashif Abbasi was talking about a legal petition filed by a lawyer against former prime minister Imran Khan.

Mr Abbasi says his name, then stops himself: “He filed an application under article six against Imran Khan… I apologise, against the chairman of Pakistan Tehreek-e Insaf.”

We tried to speak to Mr Abbasi, but he did not get back to us.

Imran Khan speaks at TEDxKarachi 2011 on Never Giving up on Your Dreams

By Prem Thakker

The former Pakistani leader remains behind bars, prompting those Pakistani-American groups that backed Trump and Republicans in 2024 to now worry they got ‘played’ by the president and his team.

GENEVA – The UN Special Rapporteur on torture, Alice Jill Edwards, today urged the Government of Pakistan to take immediate and effective action to address reports of inhumane and undignified detention conditions of former Prime Minister Imran Khan, warning that they could amount to torture and other inhuman or degrading treatment.

“I call on Pakistani authorities to ensure that Khan’s conditions of detention fully comply with international norms and standards,” Edwards said.

by Junaid S Ahmad

The tragedy of a section of Pakistan’s left is not that it misread Imran Khan politics often involves misjudgments. The real tragedy is that even after witnessing censorship, arrests, military trials, enforced disappearances, and political repression, many still chose cautious vocabulary over moral courage.

Prime Minister Imran Khan on Monday paying tribute to Pakistan’s national poet Dr Allama Muhammad Iqbal on his 143rd birth anniversary said Iqbal’s thoughts continue to be a source of inspiration and guidance.

PM Imran in his tweet shared an article of Dr Ali Shariati, renowned Iranian revolutionary and sociologist, and wrote that Iqbal’s thoughts continue to be a source of inspiration and guidance.

“He is a great mystic, with a pure spirit, delivered of materiality and, at the same time, a man who respects and honours science, technological progress, and the advancement of human reason in our age,” the PM quoted Dr Shariati.