The Supreme Court of Pakistan, on Wednesday, August 21, granted bail to former Prime Minister Imran Khan in eight cases related to the May 9 riots in 2023.
The bail was granted by a three-member bench headed by Chief Justice Yahya Afridi.
The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI) founding chairman is yet to get bail in the ninth case and hence has not been released from prison.
Khan, 72, is booked in several cases in Lahore in connection with the May 9 violence, including for allegedly inciting his supporters to attack government and military buildings.
The top court had previously granted bail to several of its leaders who were convicted by a lower court in connection with the riots.
On Wednesday, he nominated ethnic Pashtun politician Mahmood Khan Achakzai as opposition leader in the National Assembly and Azam Khan Swati as leader of the opposition in the Senate.
The key positions held by Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) leaders Omar Ayub Khan and Shibli Faraz fell vacant following their conviction late last month in a case related to the May 9, 2023, violence.
PTI secretary general Salman Akram Raja told reporters outside the Supreme Court that Khan asked for five names to decide the opposition leader in the Punjab Assembly, after Ahmad Khan Bhachar was convicted last month in a case related to the May 9 violence.
Achakzai is chief of his Pashtoonkhwa Milli Awami Party, which is part of the opposition alliance Tehreek-i-Tahaffuz Ayeen-i-Pakistan (TTAP), also headed by him.
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Khan also fielded him as a presidential candidate of his party against the incumbent Asif Ali Zardari last year.
Unlike Achakzai, the nominee for the position of the leader of the opposition in the Senate, Swati, is a senior PTI politician who is considered close to Khan.
Khan, who was ousted from office in April 2022, has been in the high-security Adiala Jail, Rawalpindi, since August 2023 after being convicted in a corruption case. He faces multiple legal cases, most of them filed after his removal from power.
(With PTI inputs)
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