Imran Khan confesses to losing cipher again during hour-long inquiry in Attock Jail

ISLAMABAD/LAHORE: Imran Khan, the former prime minister and Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) chairman, has once again admitted to losing the cipher, saying he couldn’t recall where he kept it.

According to The News, the deposed prime minister — who was ousted from office following a no-confidence motion in April last year — was responding to questions posed during an interrogation in the Attock jail by a three-member team of the Federal Investigation Agency’s (FIA) Cybercrime Circle, headed by Deputy Director Ayyaz Khan.

The investigation team grilled Khan in the missing cipher case, sources said, adding that the PTI chief cooperated during the hour-long inquiry with patience. He, however, denied that the paper he waved at a public gathering last year was the cipher.

“The paper I gestured in the public were cabinet meeting minutes, and not cipher,” the former premier claimed.

He, according to the sources, added that it was his right as the prime minister to keep the document with him, but he could not respond as to why he exposed it as the cipher in public.

“It was, probably, the last session of investigation of cipher issue,” sources said, adding that people engaged in the investigation of the case would initiate mutual meetings to come to a conclusion.

The sources mentioned that the investigation into the cipher issue would be completed during the coming week and the challan would be submitted in a court of law.

Meanwhile, Khan challenged the rejection of his nine bail applications in the Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Saturday. Following denial of bail pleas in cases involving incidents like the May 9 riots, attacks on the Judicial Complex, and fake accounts, he submitted nine applications through his lawyer, Salman Safdar, in the IHC.

Out of these applications, six were turned down by a sessions court, while three faced rejection by an anti-terrorism court (ATC). The PTI lawyer, in the petitions presented to the IHC, requested that the decisions to reject the bail pleas should be declared null and void.

Additionally, the lawyer sought the IHC guidance to have the trial courts re-evaluate the cases on their merits and prevent the police from arresting the PTI chairman in connection with these nine cases.

Khan had previously approached the Supreme Court with a petition against IHC Chief Justice Aamer Farooq. The petition, filed by his counsel Latif Khosa on his behalf, invoked Article 186-A and called for the transfer of his cases from the IHC to the Lahore or Peshawar high courts.

Separately, the FIA registered a case against the PTI leaders for launching an alleged false campaign against the state institutions on social media.

The FIA Cybercrime Circle registered the case against former finance minister Hammad Azhar, Musarrat Jamshed Cheema, former National Assembly deputy speaker Qasim Suri, former Punjab governor Omer Sarfraz Cheema, Senator Azam Swati, Istehkam-e-Pakistan Party’s Ali Zaidi and former PTI senior vice president Fawad Chaudhry.

The nominated accused were summoned by the agency for investigation but none of them joined investigations. Then the agency conducted its own investigations. The sources claimed the FIA, during the course of the inquiry, found enough evidence after which a case was registered against them.