Imran Khan, Pakistan’s former prime minister, has been moved from prison to a hospital in Islamabad, the capital, a win for his supporters in their prolonged legal battle over his medical treatment.
Two leaders of Mr. Khan’s party, Arif Alvi and Zulfikar Bukhari, confirmed that he had been moved shortly after midnight local time on Friday.
Pakistan’s Supreme Court on Tuesday had ordered that Mr. Khan, 73, be moved to Shifa International Hospital for a complete medical checkup and treatment for an eye ailment. The court also ordered the formation of a medical board to assess his condition that included Mr. Khan’s private doctors and his sister, Dr. Uzma Khan, and granted his family weekly visitation rights. His relatives will bear the cost of treatment, the court said.
The government asked the court to review the order, but it has so far declined to do so, allowing the order to take effect.
The court did not say how long he would remain in the hospital.
On Sept. 16, the court is scheduled to resume hearings on various petitions Mr. Khan has made about his medical treatment, conditions in prison and access to doctors and family, as well as a pending challenge related to one of his sentences. Mr. Khan has been imprisoned since August 2023 and was convicted last year on multiple charges of corruption.
The ruling on Mr. Khan’s medical care goes further than previous court orders, which had only mandated treatment but had not required a move out of the prison, a demand that his family and supporters had been making for months.
The battle over his medical care is part of a broader political conflict between Mr. Khan’s supporters and Pakistan’s powerful military and governing party. After his relations with the military deteriorated, Mr. Khan was removed from office in a 2022 no-confidence vote and then imprisoned on corruption charges.
He and his party, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, have said that the corruption charges are politically motivated and engineered to keep him out of politics. Pakistan’s government denies that, and it has said that the cases brought against him and his convictions have been carried out according to Pakistani law.
A charismatic political leader with an intensely loyal following, Mr. Khan first became a hero as the captain of the national cricket team, leading Pakistan to its only World Cup victory, in 1992. He then turned to philanthropy, building a major cancer hospital; entered politics; and became prime minister in 2018.
Concerns over Mr. Khan’s health have grown over the past year. His lawyers estimated this year that he had lost as much as 85 percent of his vision in an eye after delays in receiving care for a blood clot in that eye.
In recent months, Mr. Khan had been taken under guard on several occasions to the government-run Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences Hospital in Islamabad for treatment, twice for eye surgery.
Officials from Mr. Khan’s party have pushed for him to be treated at a private hospital and examined by doctors of his choosing. His supporters have also held public protests over his treatment in custody.
Prison officials said in a report filed with the court this week that Mr. Khan’s eyesight had returned to nearly normal, that he was being examined three times a day and that he and his wife had met dozens of times, in accordance with prison rules.
The prison report also recorded fluctuations in his blood pressure, heart palpitations, headaches and increased stress. The report linked some of those symptoms to his isolation and limited access to newspapers and television.
Mr. Khan is expected to remain under tight security at the Shifa hospital while doctors assess his condition. The Supreme Court directed the authorities to secure the hospital and cautioned against allowing his treatment to become a political spectacle.
Salman Akram Raja, the secretary general of Mr. Khan’s party, urged supporters to remain calm and stay away from the hospital.
“There should be no disorder and no crowds outside the hospital,” he told reporters after a court hearing on Tuesday.
Mr. Khan has retained a large political following despite his three years behind bars. During the 2024 general election, he was sentenced to prison days before the vote. He has been barred from holding public office for a decade.
The election came after a monthslong military-led campaign to neutralize Mr. Khan and his party. Its leaders and supporters were arrested in droves. The party was also barred from using its cricket bat symbol to identify its candidates on the ballot, a crucial visual cue for voters in a country with high illiteracy rates.
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