Imran Khan tells supporters to be 'peaceful' in pre-arrest video message

Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman and former prime minister Imran Khan urged his supporters to remain peaceful in a pre-recorded message released after his arrest on Saturday.

Imran Khan's party released a video message showing him at his Lahore home behind a desk and with the Pakistani and PTI flags in the background. Imran was taken into custody on Saturday after he was sentenced to three years in prison for illegally selling state gifts.

PTI chief, in his 1:57 minutes-long video statement posted on social media, told his supporters he would be in jail by the time the message reached them and that they should not stay quietly in their homes. "I am not doing this for my freedom,” he said. "I am doing it for my nation, you, your children’s future. If you don’t stand up for your rights, you will live the life of slaves and slaves do not have a life.”

He urged people to peacefully protest until they get their rights, namely a government of their choice through voting and "not the one like today's occupying power.”

Imran conviction came a day after Islamabad High Court (IHC) temporarily halted the district court trial. It was not immediately clear why the trial had proceeded despite the high court decision.

A female supporter of Imran Khan covers herself with his PTI party flag outside the Zaman park in Lahore. AP

Imran Khan's deputy and former foreign minister, Shah Mahmood Qureshi, who PTI said would lead the party in Khan's absence, said their leader had been denied a fair trial.

"We have to struggle for his freedom - we have to fight legally and politically and move in a peaceful way in line with Imran Khan's directives," he said in a video address.

The party's top decision-making body met on Saturday and called for nation-wide peaceful protests, according to a statement.

Lawyers and supporters of PTI shout slogans against Imran Khan's arrest outside his residence in Lahore. AFP

In Lahore, a group of pro-Imran lawyers reached his Zaman Park home and chanted slogans protesting his conviction and arrest. In the same city, supporters of a rival political party handed out sweets to celebrate the detention.

His former political secretary Aun Chaudhry said Saturday's events will aid political stability, while Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari described the day's developments as comeuppance for Imran Khan.

But a former PTI government minister, Ali Mohammad Khan, said the opposition leader had been denied justice. "Imran Khan’s conviction will be quashed and he will be released soon,” he said.

Imran Khan is the seventh former prime minister to be arrested in Pakistan. Zulfikar Ali Bhutto was arrested and hanged in 1979. The current prime minister’s brother, Nawaz Sharif, who also served as prime minister, was arrested several times on corruption allegations.

Agencies