Pakistan’s former Prime Minister Imran Khan was shot and wounded today in an apparent assassination attempt at a crowded protest rally in Wazirabad.
Khan is reportedly not in danger and has been taken to a hospital. A suspect was apprehended.
Khan was wounded when shots were fired from the crowd near Gujranwala, his senior aide, Raoof Hasan, told AFP.
“This was an attempt to kill him, to assassinate him,” Hasan said, adding that one alleged attacker had been shot dead and a second taken into police custody.
In a tweet, Pakistan’s President Arif Alvi also called it “a heinous assassination attempt”.
“I thank Allah that he is safe but injured with few bullets in his leg & hopefully non-critical,” he tweeted.
Pakistan has been grappling with Islamist militants for decades, and politicians are frequently targeted by assassination attempts.
In 2007 the nation’s first female leader Benazir Bhutto was slain in a suicide attack which still remains unsolved.
The former international cricket star was booted from office in April by a no-confidence vote after defections by some of his coalition partners, but he retains mass public support in the South Asian country.
