Imran Khan’s ex-wife says former Pak PM is in ‘solitary confinement'

London: The ex-wife of Pakistan's former prime minister Imran Khan on Tuesday said Khan is ‘kept in solitary confinement, literally in dark’ in a Pakistani prison, news agency AFP reported.

Jemima Goldsmith claimed in a post on platform X that Pakistani authorities stopped his family and lawyers from visiting him alongside having his court hearings postponed.

Calling for his immediate release, Goldsmith said that Pakistani authorities prevented the leader from calling his two sons since early December.

Goldsmith, who was married to Khan from 1995 to 2004, further said that electricity to his cell was cut, jail cook was sent on leave and he was no longer allowed out.

‘He is now completely isolated, in solitary confinement, literally in the dark, with no contact with the outside world,’ Goldsmith reportedly wrote.

Goldsmith’s allegations come after a UN panel of experts in July called out Pakistan for ‘arbitrarily detaining Khan’, breaching international law thus preventing him from contesting polls.

The 72-year-old former cricketer, who ruled the country from 2018 to 2022, found himself enmeshed in more than 200 legal cases after he was ousted from office in a no-confidence vote.

Goldsmith claimed that Khan’s political opponents issued rape and death threats to her.

She pointed out that ‘Khan's family had also been targeted, and his sisters and nephew were arrested and jailed unlawfully’.

She sought the release of Khan, his nephew and sisters alongside allowing him to have contact with the couple’s two sons, Sulaiman and Kasim, who live in London.