Who is Imran Khan? – Worldnews Ira

Imran Khan was elected Prime Minister of Pakistan in 2018 when he ran as a nationalist with a promise to fight corruption, revive the country’s struggling economy and maintain an independent foreign policy that drove Pakistan away from the United States.

Born into a wealthy family in Lahore and educated at Oxford University, Mr Khan, 69, achieved his first international fame on the cricket field in the late 1970s and became a regular in London’s fashionable crowd. In 1995, he married Jemima Goldsmith, a British heir.

A year later, Mr Khan sought to cut his popularity from cricket – leading Pakistan to his only World Cup victory in 1992 – in a political career, establishing his own party, the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, or Movement for Justice. . As a politician, he portrayed himself as a reformer who proposed an alternative to Pakistan’s political dynasty.

For more than a decade, Mr. Khan struggled for political entry and was ridiculed for his political ambitions. But by 2011, he began to gain political momentum, attracting millions of Pakistanis to his rallies. Many were inspired by his popularity, his anti-corruption and anti-American message.

By then, the former international playboy had taken a religious form of Islam and wanted to change his personal image. In 2018, Mr. Khan married his spiritual advisor Bushra Bibi for the third time. (His marriage to Mrs. Goldsmith ended in divorce, and he briefly married Reham Khan, a broadcaster in 2015.)

After winning the support of military leaders, Mr Khan became prime minister in 2018. Many of his rivals have accused the military of rigging the election on his behalf – an allegation both Mr Khan and the military have denied. He initiated a new foreign policy, moving away from the United States and closer to Russia and China.

Mr Khan’s relatively stable tenure began to calm down at the end of last year, as dissatisfaction with the management of his economy escalated and he had to pay a price for support due to a dispute with the military over its leadership.