Sons of Imran Khan criticize PCB chairman over Lord's Test controversy and prison conditions

Imran Khan (Image credit: X)

The sons of former Pakistan captain and Prime Minister Imran Khan have strongly criticised Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) chairman Mohsin Naqvi after the board was accused of threatening to abandon the Lord’s Test against England. Sulaiman and Kasim Khan also raised serious concerns about their father's health and conditions in prison, claiming that Pakistan authorities are trying to silence him. The controversy began during the second Test at Lord’s after Sky Sports aired an interview conducted by former England captain Michael Atherton with Sulaiman and Kasim. They spoke about their father's health and his conditions in prison. Reports later claimed that the PCB threatened not to send the Pakistan team out for the post-lunch session on the first day unless the interview was taken off air.

‘They're clearly hoping to kill him in there’

With Mohsin Naqvi facing increased scrutiny, the sons also spoke about their concerns over Khan's solitary confinement. Kasim made a serious allegation about the former Pakistan captain's safety. “They're clearly hoping to kill him in there. They want to silence him as secretly as possible and just slowly make him fade into nothing. “That's a very difficult thing to do with the most popular person in Pakistan right now. Their strategy, whenever we speak, is to let everything fizzle out and then impose more brutal restrictions that make it even harder for him to survive.”

‘They made absolute fools of themselves’

Kasim criticised the PCB's reported reaction and said the board had damaged its own image. “They made absolute fools of themselves,” Kasim told The Telegraph on Sunday. Sulaiman said he was surprised that the PCB reacted so strongly to an interview about his father. “I was expecting some sort of response. But I didn't think they would be so tactless as to threaten not to take to the field. “It shouldn't be in the remit of the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) to ask for an interview about an ex-Pakistan player, somebody who lived in England for 22 years, to be taken down. This wasn't about politics, but about the humanitarian situation and his health.”

Authorities deny mistreatment claims

Pakistani authorities have repeatedly denied allegations of mistreatment and have maintained that Khan is receiving proper medical care. Sulaiman, however, questioned those assurances and said the family had not been given enough information about his father's condition. “The worrying theory we're hearing is that they're drip-feeding these reports of his ailing health and pretending that they're trying to help him, just to lay the ground for something worse to happen. Then they can wash their hands and say: 'He's just an old man who died, and we had nothing to do with it.’

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“They haven't given us proof of any of this. It's all just hearsay from government sources – there's no transparency, they don't want to give anyone access, so how are we supposed to believe any of it? The last verifiable piece of information we had was from him, six months ago, when he spoke about his eye and how it had been neglected.”

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