PESHAWAR – PTI Chairman and former prime minister Imran Khan claimed on Tuesday that the murder of slain journalist Arshad Sharif was an incident of “target killing”.
“No matter what anyone says, I know, it is a target killing,” the PTI chief stressed while addressing a lawyer’s convention in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s capital city of Peshawar.
On October 23, the senior journalist was shot dead by the Kenyan Police in a “mistaken identity” case while he was returning to Nairobi from Kenya’s Magadi town. Police claimed that they opened fire after the vehicle breached a blockade.
Imran Khan said that he had received information that Sharif would be killed in order to stop him from speaking truth.
Saying the slain journalist had received threats from unknown numbers, the PTI chief said that he had asked him to go abroad, but he did not listen.
Chairman PTI @ImranKhanPTI talks about Shaheed Arshad Sharif pic.twitter.com/2yPBVkQxSe
— PTI (@PTIofficial) October 25, 2022
Khan said that he considered Arshad Sharif the most respected figure in the field of journalism as he always stood by the truth.
The former prime minister also talked about the alleged torture on senior party leader Azam Khan Swati in custody of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) after he was arrested in a case related to controversial tweets.
Khan vowed to fight the oppressors until his last breath, adding that such tactics cannot bar him from speaking what is right.
Earlier in the day, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has announced to form a judicial commission to probe the killing of Arshad Sharif as several journalists and social media users have claimed foul play in his murder.
Pakistan announces judicial commission to probe Arshad Sharif’s killing in Kenya
