PAKISTAN-IMRAN KHAN RALLY Massive crowd attends Imran Khan’s anti-government rally

Record ID: 214778

  • Title: PAKISTAN-IMRAN KHAN RALLY Massive crowd attends Imran Khan’s anti-government rally
  • Date: 28th September 2014
  • Summary: PANNING SHOT OF CROWD/ MEDIA CAMERAS
  • Embargoed: 13th October 2014 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Pakistan
  • Country: Pakistan
  • Topics: General
  • Reuters ID: LVA2JTJY5YOCRMGKBYXU69VPN4E0
  • Story Text: Pakistani opposition leader, Imran Khan on Sunday (September 28) took the campaign to unseat Nawaz Sharif to the prime minister's home base of Lahore, where tens of thousands of people roared their support for change.
    Pakistan has been in a state of turmoil since August when protesters led by Imran Khan, a former cricket star, and Tahir ul-Qadri, a firebrand cleric, stormed into the capital and occupied an area home to government buildings and foreign embassies.
    In the latest twist, Khan organised a rally of tens of thousands of people in Lahore, the political homebase of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, saying protests would continue around the country until the government quits.
    "Our sit-in will continue in Islamabad, but I will go around waking up the rest of Pakistan. That is why I say to Nawaz Sharif, 'Do not resign soon. Stay on until I have woken up the entire nation.' " Khan said..
    "Lahorites, I thank you, and I promise you that your pain will be my pain; your sorrows will be my sorrows; your happiness will be my happiness; your prosperity will be my prosperity. You stand by me, and God willing, I will never leave you alone," he told a roaring crowd of up to 100,000 in Pakistan's cultural capital.
    The persistent protests have become an embarrassment for Sharif in a military coup-prone nation, with some in the prime minister's administration accusing the all-powerful army of instigating the movement as a way of weakening Sharif.
    The army has denied meddling in civilian affairs, saying it is neutral, but in a country ruled for half of its history by the military, most commentators agree it is ultimately up to the army to decide how the crisis ends.
    The protest leaders accuse Sharif of rigging last year's election which brought him back to power in a landslide, a charge he denies.
    The confrontation turned violent last month, with thousands trying to storm Sharif's house in the capital Islamabad and briefly taking the state television channel off the air.
    Unrest in Pakistan is a worry to regional powers who are concerned about more political violence in a country bordering Afghanistan, where most foreign troops are due to leave this year following more than a decade of war against the Taliban.
    Khan is a charismatic Oxford graduate whose populist slogans have struck a chord with many Pakistanis fed up with incessant power cuts and lack of job opportunities.
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