On Tuesday, a Pakistani court sentenced the former Pakistani prime minister to 10 years in prison Imran KhanAnd the prominent leader of the party PTIShah Mehmood Qureshi, in a controversial case related to the leaking of secret documents.

Pakistani media reported that the ruling was issued by a special court during a brief hearing that took place in Adyala Prison in the city of Rawalpindi, adjacent to Islamabad.

Agence France-Presse quoted a spokesman for the Tehreek-e-Insaf party, which Khan founded, as saying, “Former Prime Minister Imran Khan and the party’s vice president, Qureshi, were each sentenced to 10 years in prison in the leak case.”

The Pakistani authorities charged Khan with leaking secret documents last October, according to what the Pakistani Federal Investigation Agency announced at the time.

The former cricket star was imprisoned in August 2023 after being convicted of corruption and sentenced to 3 years in prison. But a Pakistani court overturned the ruling, and despite that, he was kept in prison because another judge ordered his continued detention pending another case related to suspicion of publishing official documents.

The case in which the former Pakistani prime minister was sentenced to 10 years in prison relates to a telegram that Khan said was evidence that his ouster from office was the result of an American conspiracy supported by the Pakistani army.

Weeks before his ouster in April 2022, Khan claimed that the United States had hatched a conspiracy with his opponents to oust him because he had become close to Russian President Vladimir Putin.

At a public gathering in Islamabad, Khan waved a piece of paper claiming to be the telegram sent by the Pakistani ambassador to the United States, which was considered evidence.

Khan is considered the most popular politician in Pakistan, and he says that his removal from office and the legal issues raised around him were orchestrated by the military establishment with the aim of depriving him of running for a second term.