Imran Khan: U.S. Was Manipulated By Pakistan Military Into Backing Overthrow

Deconstructed

The Intercept

News

4.8 • 4.7K Ratings

🗓️ 6 June 2023

⏱️ 31 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Imran Khan became Pakistan’s prime minister through a most unusual route. As he explained in an interview on Sunday night, Khan was for decades the nation’s most famous cricketer, before transitioning into the world of philanthropy, building hospitals and supporting universities. From there, he moved into politics, founding a party — the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, or PTI — and sweeping into power in 2018. But he had a slim majority, and was ousted in a no-confidence vote by 2022. Since then, he and his party have been the target of a relentless crackdown by the nation’s military, which has ruled the country directly or indirectly for decades. On this week's Deconstructed, Ryan Grim speaks to Khan about his career, the political crisis facing Pakistan, and his diminishing hope for a negotiated resolution.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to the Deconstructed, I'm Ryan Grimm.
0:07.1	Imran Khan became Pakistan's prime minister through a most unusual route.
0:11.6	For decades, he was the nation's most famous cricketer before transitioning into the
0:15.4	world of philanthropy building hospitals and supporting universities.
0:18.8	From there, he moved into politics, founding a party, the PTI, and sweeping into power
0:23.8	in 2018.
0:24.8	But he had a slim majority and was ousted in a no-confidence vote by 2022.
0:30.4	Since then, he and his party have been the target of a relentless crackdown by the nation's
0:34.0	military which has ruled the country directly or indirectly for decades.
0:38.3	He's my guest today on Deconstructed.
0:40.6	Our earlier attempt to schedule an interview was foiled when he was arrested on May 9th
0:44.6	by the military and held for four days before the Supreme Court ruled his detention illegal.
0:49.6	Protests had erupted nationwide, some turning violent and the military establishment
0:54.5	has responded by arresting most of Khan's senior leadership and forcing them to resign
0:58.7	publicly from the party under pressure.
1:01.4	Thousands of rank and file party workers have also been jailed.
1:05.0	Khan, meanwhile, is holed up in his home in Lahore, sifting through some 150 charges
1:09.8	of corruption and other offenses that have been leveled at him, charges that he and his
1:13.2	supporters dismiss as politically motivated.
1:16.1	Yet Khan remains a popular political figure heading into elections that are scheduled for
1:20.5	October.
1:21.5	He joined me Sunday night to discuss his career, the political crisis facing Pakistan and
	...

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