Pakistan Elections 2024: Former Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan and other prominent incarcerated political figures have cast their votes through a postal ballot from Adiala Jail but his wife Bushra Bibi was unable to partake in the voting.
Pakistan Elections 2024: The government's decision comes amidst a rise in militant attacks in the run-up to the election and a day after jailed former Prime Minister Imran Khan urged his supporters to wait outside polling booths after voting until results are announced.
Pakistan election 2024 voting process is scheduled to begin at 8 am (03:00 GMT) and will continue, without a break, till 5 pm (12:00 GMT). Those already in the queue to vote at 5 pm will be allowed to vote even if that extends the process.
Pakistan Election 2024 Live Updates: Voting has ended in Pakistan after eight hours amid claims of rigging and attacks on security personnel. The polls began against the backdrop of former PM Imran Kha's imprisonment, an economic crisis, rising militant violence and other woes.
Nearly 650,000 security personnel have been deployed across poll-bound Pakistan, including the personnel of police, civil armed forces, and the armed forces. At least 128 million Pakistanis will vote for 44 political parties contesting for 266 seats in the National Assembly.
Pre-poll violence and targeting of election candidates and voters in different provinces are common features of Pakistan polls. The year is no different, as several independent candidates have been killed, provinces have been rocked by bomb blasts and Imran Khan's party is reeling under a crackdown.
The first attack, which killed 12, took place at the office of an independent election candidate in Pishin district. The second explosion in Qilla Saifullah, a town near the Afghan border, detonated near an office of Jamiat Ulema Islam (JUI), a religious party that has previously been the target.
Previously Khan's supporters have disseminated his messages, including through AI-generated audio speeches, from notes he has passed on through his lawyers during prison visits.
Pakistan elections: The South Asian nation of 241 million people is reeling from decades-high inflation and an economy that has come to a grinding halt as it navigates a tough International Monetary Fund (IMF) bailout programme.
Pakistan's National Assembly has 336 seats, including 266 general seats, 60 seats reserved for women, and 10 for non-Muslims, a decrease of six seats overall after fresh delimitation. A total of 18,000 candidates would participate in federal and provincial elections on Thursday.
Pakistan is facing a rising threat of attacks by militant outfits in the tun-up to the general elections on Thursday, with Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan being rocked by a series of explosions. Jailed ex-PM Imran Khan's party is also battling a military-backed crackdown that has attracted scorn.
Dr Yasmin Rashid, running against Nawaz in Lahore's NA-130 constituency, was indicted in connection with the May 9 riots, where several military installations were vandalised in the wake of Imran's arrest. PTI leaders are contesting as independents as the party has been denied its electoral symbol.
Pakistan- a country where civilian governments have been upended by military takeovers and where the army has ruled the nation for half of its 76 years of independence, it’s often the traditional elites that have called the shots. Here are the key players ahead of the country’s elections.
Ahead of the mandatory moratorium, all major parties have plans for using the last day to hold rallies across the country with top leaders like Nawaz Sharif, Maryam Nawaz, Shehbaz Sharif, Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, Asif Ali Zardari, Maulana Fazlur Reham and other addressing rallies in various cities.
Bilawal said it would be difficult for him to join hands with the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) party if it came to power after the February 8 polls. Bilawal said both major political parties, other than the PPP, engage in politics of hatred and division.
US State Department Deputy Spokesperson Vedant Patel said that it wants the broad participation of the people of Pakistan in the country's election adding concerns over the recent violence that rocked the country's Balochistan province.
A report said that high-profile prisoners could not be kept in jail factories, kitchens, hospitals, gardens, etc, among ordinary inmates. Therefore, both Imran Khan and Qureshi will be kept there in their compound for maintenance work or any other task assigned by the jail administration.
Saeed, who has been incarcerated in a jail in Lahore, has been sentenced to a total of 31 years by Pakistan's anti-terrorism courts in several cases of financing terrorism.
The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) stripped the PTI of its electoral symbol after declaring its intra-party elections held last year "unconstitutional". The PTI is battling a military-led crackdown ahead of the elections as its founder Imran Khan has been handed two back-to-back convictions.
Rehan Zaib Khan, contesting as an independent after the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf was denied an electoral symbol, was canvassing in the area when he was shot by unidentified assailants. Balochistan was rocked by several grenade blasts and the death of a political party worker on Wednesday.
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