RAWALPINDI, Pakistan — Former prime minister
of Pakistan
Imran Khan will address thousands of supporters Saturday at his
first public appearance since being shot earlier this month in an assassination
attempt he blamed on his successor.
اضافة اعلان
The shooting was the latest twist in months of
political turmoil that began in April when Khan was ousted by a vote of no
confidence in parliament.
Saturday’s rally is the climax of a so-called “long
march” by
Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party to press the government
to call a snap election before parliament’s term expires in October next year.
“My life is in danger, and despite being injured I
am going to Rawalpindi for the nation,” PTI quoted Khan as saying in a morning
tweet.
“My nation will come to Rawalpindi for me.”
A video was circulating Saturday of aides posing
with a now-removed blue cast that Khan wore on his right leg after the
shooting.
The rally is in Rawalpindi, a garrison city neighboring
the capital Islamabad and home to the headquarters of the country’s powerful
military.
Saghir Ahmed was among thousands arriving in the
long build-up to Khan’s speech as a crane lowered bulletproof glass panels
around a lectern on a stage draped with banners depicting a clenched fist
breaking shackles.
Khan, 70, attracts cultish devotion from supporters,
but on Saturday he will make his speech hundreds of meters from the bulk of the
crowd for security reasons.
In the November 3 assassination attempt, a gunman
opened fire from close range as Khan’s open-top container truck made its way
through a crowded street.
Buildings overlooking the site of Saturday’s rally
were searched overnight, a police official told AFP, while snipers were perched
on rooftops surveying the mostly male supporters carrying red and green
banners.
Authorities have thrown a ring of steel around
Islamabad to prevent Khan’s supporters from marching on government buildings,
with thousands of security personnel deployed and roads blocked by shipping
containers.
Khan-led protests in May spiraled into 24 hours of chaos,
with the capital blockaded and running clashes across Pakistan between police
and protesters.
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