Imran Khan appeals to Pakistan Supreme Court to probe alleged rigging in elections

ISLAMABAD:Opposition leader Imran Khan has appealed to Pakistan's Supreme Court to probe the rigging allegations in the last year's elections won by Nawaz Sharif's PML-N party.

"One way of resolving the current crisis is that the Supreme Court conducts a free and fair audit of the last general elections.

"I have given the JI emir my suggestions regarding a Supreme Court-supervised investigation," Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf chairman Imran said while addressing media with Jamaat-i-Islami (JI) chief Sirajul Haq.

Dawn reported today that Imran was open for Supreme Court-led, but time-bound investigations into the result of elections.

He, however, once again said an impartial inquiry could not be carried out, nor the guilty parties punished as long as the Prime Minister Sharif was in power.

Cricketer-turned-politician Imran further said he did not accept the current National Assembly or Prime Minister as having been genuinely elected.

The apex court recently struck down a petition filed by a Tehreek-i-Insaf leader, seeking to declare the last year's general elections null and void.

Khan has been holding a series of anti-government protest rallies in the country since mid-August to press Sharif to resign besides demanding a thorough judicial probe into alleged rigging in the general election which his party lost.

In August, Sharif had requested the Supreme Court to set up a three-member judicial commission to probe allegations of rigging of polls. The apex court, till date, has not taken any action.

Following the anti-government protests, Tehreek-i-Insaf and PML-N held talks to determine the terms for the proposed judicial commission but couldn't evolve a consensus.

Tehreek-i-Insaf and its coalition partner JI share government in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.