ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Prime Minister Imran Khan dissolved Pakistan’s National Assembly and called for new elections on Sunday, blocking a no-confidence vote that had been widely expected to remove him from office and plunging the country into a constitutional crisis.
The extraordinary move deepened the political turmoil that has gripped Pakistan since Mr. Khan, the international cricket star turned politician, lost the backing of the country’s powerful military and a coalition of opposition parties.
The crisis has been escalating for weeks, but its latest turn threatens to destabilize the fragile democracy in Pakistan, a nuclear-armed nation that supports the Taliban in neighboring Afghanistan and has struggled with instability and military coups since its founding 75 years ago. Still, even in a country accustomed to turmoil, Sunday’s events were stunning.
“Never in the history of Pakistan has such a thing happened,” said Ashtar Ausaf Ali, the former attorney general of Pakistan.
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