Pakistan's former PM Nawaz Sharif (AFP)

ISLAMABAD: In a blow to Prime Minister Imran Khan-led government, a Pakistani court on Saturday allowed former prime minister Nawaz Sharif to travel abroad for four weeks for medical treatment, ignoring government’s conditions that he will have to deposit security bonds before leaving the country.

A two-member bench of the Lahore High Court (HC) ordered the federal government to immediately remove Sharif’s name from the Exit Control List (ECL) without any conditions.

The court’s decision further stated that in case Sharif’s health doesn’t improve during the four-week time, then the time-period can be extended.

The court also approved undertakings of former PM and his younger brother Shahbaz Sharif, who is also president of opposition Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) party, assuring that he will return to the country within four weeks.

Sharif was shifted to hospital from Lahore’s Kot Lakhpat jail last month after doctors warned that his health was deteriorating. He has been diagnosed with an immune system disorder and his condition was said to be critical. Due to health reasons, the Lahore and Islamabad high courts had subsequently granted him bails in two separate graft cases.

Last week, Shehbaz Sharif had submitted a request to the home ministry and the National Accountabitility Bureau, Pakistan’s anti-corruption watchdog, for removal of Nawaz’s name from the no-fly list so that he could seek medical treatment abroad.

Since Sharif’s release from jail on bail, a section of the ruling Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) was trying to convince PM Imran Khan not to allow him leaving Pakistan, saying it would be a complete defeat of the government’s accountability narrative on which they had contested and won the national polls in July 2018. On the other hand, some PTI leaders believed that the former PM’s departure would be politically beneficial, allowing enough of space for the party to complete its term in office.

