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A classified Pakistani diplomatic cable that Imran Khan has long cited as proof that the United States engineered his removal from power has been published in full for the first time.

Cable I-0678, stamped “secret”, marked “no circulation” and dated March 7, 2022 – published by US investigative news outlet Drop Site News – documents a luncheon meeting between Pakistan’s then ambassador in Washington, Asad Majeed Khan, and Donald Lu, the US Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs. 

What Lu told the ambassador that afternoon would, within weeks, become the most explosive document in Pakistani political history.

A relationship already under strain

By early 2022, Washington and Islamabad were barely on speaking terms. President Joe Biden had refused to take Imran Khan’s calls since taking office in January 2021. When CIA Director William Burns flew to Islamabad in June that year to request Pakistani territory for US drone bases following the American withdrawal from Afghanistan, Khan refused to see him, citing protocol.

The relationship deteriorated further when Khan flew to Moscow on February 24, 2022 – the same day Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine – for a long-scheduled meeting with President Putin. Photographs of the two shaking hands went viral as news of the invasion broke. Days later, Pakistan abstained from a UN General Assembly resolution condemning the invasion, joining China, India and much of the Global South. 

Washington’s patience, already thin, had run out.

What the cable says

According to the secret cable, Lu opened the meeting by raising Washington’s frustration with what called as Pakistan’s “aggressively neutral” position on Ukraine, saying it did not seem neutral at all from where the US stood. He said the view in Washington was that this position was tied to Khan personally and to the prime minister’s domestic political needs.

When the ambassador pushed back and asked whether the strong US reaction was driven specifically by Pakistan refraining from the UN resolution, Lu was direct. That was not the primary issue but the Moscow visit was, he said. He then told the ambassador, “I think if the no confidence vote against the Prime Minister succeeds, all will be forgiven in Washington because the Russia visit is being looked at as a decision by the Prime Minister.”

He added that if the political situation did not change, isolation of the prime minister “will become very strong from Europe and the United States.”

The ambassador, in his written assessment at the end of the cable, noted that Lu had also been evasive when asked why the US appeared to apply different standards to India, which had also abstained at the UN, and Pakistan. Lu responded that Washington viewed the US-India relationship primarily through the lens of China.

Critically, the ambassador concluded that Lu “could not have conveyed such a strong demarche without the express approval of the White House,” and recommended Pakistan consider a formal counter-demarche to the US chargé d’affaires in Islamabad. The cable was marked for distribution to the secretary to the Prime Minister, the Foreign Secretary, the Chief of Army Staff, and the Director General of the ISI.

Khan was removed in a no-confidence vote on April 9, 2022 – 33 days after the cable was sent.

Why it matters now

The contents of the cable were first reported by The Intercept in August 2023, based on a source within Pakistan’s military who had access to the document and described deep disillusionment with the army’s involvement in Khan’s ouster.

Drop Site News released the document in full, unredacted and in its original form, so that it becomes part of the public historical record, the outlet said.

The fallout

Whether or not the cable constitutes proof of a conspiracy, what followed Khan’s removal is not in dispute. Under the military-backed government that replaced him, Islamabad reversed course on nearly every position Khan had held. 

Pakistan became a quiet supplier of artillery to Ukraine. It signed a mutual defence pact with Saudi Arabia that Khan had refused. It pulled back from China, allowing the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor’s second phase to stall. It aligned itself closely with the Trump administration, including signing a memorandum with a Donald Trump family-linked cryptocurrency firm.

Khan and his wife Bushra Bibi remain in prison on charges his supporters say are politically motivated. Multiple cases against him have collapsed under scrutiny, only to be replaced with new ones. Khan has been held in solitary confinement since last year.

Pakistan’s army chief, General Asim Munir, who Khan once sacked as ISI director, has since promoted himself to Field Marshal and consolidated control over the country’s nuclear command. These are unprecedented steps in Pakistani history. Donald Trump has called him “my favourite Field Marshal.”