The Pakistan Cricket Board reportedly made a formal complaint to Sky Sports after the broadcaster aired an interview with the sons of former Prime Minister Imran Khan during the lunch interval on the first day of the Lord’s Test.
Michael Atherton conducted the interview with Imran Khan’s sons, Sulaiman Khan and Kasim Khan, in the Writers’ Room at Lord’s. The PCB contacted Sky ahead of the lunch break to protest, stating that players would not return to the field after the break if the interview was broadcast.
Sky delayed the broadcast before eventually running an 18-minute clip of the conversation. The PCB had considered the option of Pakistan not taking the field after the break in protest. In Pakistan, PTV, which was broadcasting the series, did not air the interview. The sons had expressed concern about the health of their father, who has been in prison for three years, and said they feared for his life.
“They made absolute fools of themselves,” Kasim told The Telegraph.
Sulaiman Khan explained his perspective on the PCB’s involvement in the matter.
“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,” Sulaiman Khan added.
Sulaiman Khan on the PCB’s overreach
Kasim Khan expressed deeper concerns about his father’s treatment and the PCB’s role in the situation.
“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,” Kasim Khan noted.
He added that the strategy appeared designed to suppress discussion of Imran Khan’s condition while making his circumstances increasingly difficult.
The brothers raised concerns about the handling of a Supreme Court order regarding their father’s medical care. Pakistan’s Supreme Court had ordered Imran admitted to Shifa Hospital, but instead he was taken to state-run PIMS and returned to prison shortly after a check-up. Imran’s sisters and sons alleged this was a violation of the court order and demanded he be allowed to see his personal doctor.
Concerns about Imran Khan’s health and detention
Kasim Khan described the hospital episode as problematic and opaque.
“It was a complete charade, and very murky from our perspective. The doctors at Shifa were left waiting for him with our auntie, who is also a medic. Everyone who had been booked, everything that had been ordered, was just ignored,” Kasim Khan said.
Sulaiman Khan outlined what he described as a concerning pattern regarding reports of his father’s health.
“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, ‘ Sulaiman concluded.
The brothers’ statements reflected their alarm about their father’s condition and what they viewed as attempts to control the narrative around his detention.
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