'Serious apprehensions': Imran's lawyer urges CJP to order transfer to hospital, family access

• Lawyer Latif Khosa pens letter to CJP Yahya Afridi.
• Lawyer demands personal doctors’ access to Khan.
• PTI founder Imran Khan’s vision has been affected.

ISLAMABAD: PTI founder Imran Khan’s lawyer, Latif Khosa, has urged Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Yahya Afridi to order authorities to shift the incarcerated former prime minister to Al-Shifa Hospital as he suffers from an eye condition.

In a letter sent to the apex court's top judge on Monday, the lawyer said that he was demanding his client’s transfer “for immediate treatment of his ailment, which clearly cannot be adequately treated” within Adiala jail, where he has been imprisoned since 2023.

The cricketer-turned-politician has lost 85% of the sight in his right eye, his other lawyer, Salman Safdar, said, who met him at the Rawalpindi prison following orders from the Supreme Court’s CJP-led bench. Following the revelation, the opposition alliance has staged a sit-in, which has entered its fourth day, demanding Imran’s transfer to the medical facility.

Khosa, in the letter, claimed that his client’s “fundamental and statutory rights have consistently been violated” since his incarceration.

While earlier Imran's family members and close associates were permitted to meet him in accordance with jail rules, the lawyer mentioned, it has now been “over four to five months that no meeting has been allowed. His family has effectively been denied access to him".

The lawyer said that Imran is 73 years old and added that his advancing age and declining health are matters of grave concern not only for his family but for the “people of Pakistan at large”.

“For the past few months, reports have surfaced across Pakistan raising serious concerns regarding the deterioration of [Imran Khan’s] eyesight and overall health. These reports, coupled with the continued denial of access to family members, have created deep uncertainty.”

Khosa added that following a Supreme Court-ordered report, a medical check-up was conducted inside the jail on February 15 and “shockingly, the said examination was carried out in complete absence of his family members, personal doctors, or legal representatives”.

“...Given the findings recorded in the report submitted before this Honourable Court, the conduct of a medical examination in secrecy, without notice to the family or independent doctors, has given rise to serious apprehensions.”

The lawyer demanded that the court direct authorities concerned to provide an attested copy of the medical report and permit immediate access to Imran’s personal doctors — including Dr Faisal Sultan and Dr Asim Yousaf.

He also said that the top court should direct that the former prime minister be shifted to Al-Shifa Hospital for immediate treatment of his ailment and that his family members be duly informed and granted reasonable access regarding his medical condition and any future medical procedures.