Incarcerated founder of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Imran Khan has refused to name those who operate his social media accounts before a special three-member team from the National Cyber Crime Investigation Agency (NCCIA), a leading English outlet reported on Tuesday.
Additional Director Ayaz Khan, along with two Sub-Inspectors (SI), namely Muneeb Zafar and Muhammad Waseem Khan, were among the team which visited Adiala Jail to question Imran Khan about posts and the operation of his X (formerly Twitter) and other social media accounts.
“If I tell, they [operators] will be kidnapped,” the outlet quoted Khan as saying.
When investigators pressed the former premier, he became agitated, at one point attempting to leave the room. Accusing the lead investigator of personal bias, he stated that the additional director had filed “cipher” and fake-account cases against him in the past.
“I don’t even want to see Ayaz Khan, his conscience is dead,” Khan told investigators.
Investigators also asked directly whether foreign nationals, or Jibran Ilyas, were involved or whether agencies such as the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), or Mossad were operating the accounts.
Citing the transcript, the outlet said that Khan ruled out the allegations, maintaining, “My accounts are not run by Jibran Ilyas. Jibran Ilyas is the most patriotic […] and you know who is with Mossad.”
Jibran Ilyas was born in Pakistan but shifted to the United States (US), Chicago, in his teens. He is a cybersecurity expert working on data breaches for Google and teaches digital forensics at Northwestern University.
Ilyas began volunteering for Khan’s party in 2011 and became its social media lead in 2022, coordinating its digital strategy from Chicago.
Inquiring about how messages from the jail reach the outside world, the investigators asked, “Who takes your [Imran Khan’s] message out of jail?”
Khan responded that there is no special courier, adding that he is in long periods of solitary confinement, is not allowed to meet political leadership, and that when someone does meet him, he simply sends the message on to the social-media team.
The outlet quoted sources as further reporting that when Khan was told his sister Aleema Khan, during the investigation, named Ilyas as his account handler, he said: “Aleema has nothing to do with politics.”
On being asked whether the social-media output was intended to stir unrest, Khan told investigators he was not spreading unrest, adding his posts criticise the government’s tribal-district operations and that “for 20 years I have warned against becoming part of other powers’ wars.”
He concluded by saying that party leaders repost his messages out of fear of bearing the consequences themselves.