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 Pakistan's former prime minister Imran Khan gathered hundreds of supporters in the eastern city of Lahore on Friday to join a caravan of cars and trucks heading for the capital Islamabad to pressure the government into calling snap polls.

Since being ousted in April through a parliamentary vote, Khan has held rallies across Pakistan, stirring opposition against a government that is struggling to bring the economy out of the crisis that Khan's administration left it in.

Khan plans to lead the motorised caravan slowly northwards up the Grand Trunk Road to Islamabad, drawing more support along the way before entering the capital in a week.

By the time he gets there, Khan said he expects to have hundreds of thousands of people with him, and his Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party has asked authorities in the capital to allow a protest sit-in.

"I want that all of you participate. This is not for politics or personal gain, or to topple the government... this is to bring genuine freedom to the country," Khan said in a video message on the eve of the march.

PTI members told journalists on Friday that the party was willing to negotiate with Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif's coalition government if it announced a date for a snap election.

The government says polls will be held as scheduled in October next year. Khan says he is not willing to wait.

DONE THIS BEFORE

The growing crowd of Khan supporters in Lahore chanted slogans including “Imran Tere Jannisar, Beshumar, Beshumar", meaning "Imran, countless people are willing to give their life for you".

Laila, a mother of two from Toba Tek Singh, a city in the eastern province of Punjab, echoed those sentiments.

"I have come to Lahore to join the long march with my husband and two sons aged nine and 11. I am not concerned about security as Khan is struggling for a better future for my children," she said, adding that she and her family would go to Islamabad and stay till the end.

As Khan's supporters assembled in Lahore, large numbers of police were deployed along the 260-kilometres (160-mile) route to Islamabad.

Khan has used this tactic before - most recently in May, weeks after he lost power. But that time police used tear gas after clashing with Khan's supporters as they approached Islamabad's sensitive "red zone", and the rally quickly dispersed.

This time Khan has called on protesters to stay peaceful, and given assurances that he would not enter the 'red zone' and the protest remain in areas designated by the courts and local administration, but given the politically charged environment the fears of violence persist.

COLD SHOULDERED BY THE GENERALS

The federal government, which runs Islamabad, has indicated that any deviation from approved protest plans will be met with force from the city's police.

Khan's party is in government in two of Islamabad's neighbouring provinces, Punjab and Khyber-Pakhtunkwa, and the provincial police forces are expected to be providing security to marchers.

With security enhanced in the capital and augmented by paramilitary forces, there is a fear that the forces could come face to face.

Crucially, Khan lacks backing from Pakistan's powerful military, which has directly ruled the country for more than three of the seven-and-a-half decades since independence.

Having once been regarded as close to the generals, Khan has accused the military of supporting his opponents move to oust him. The country's powerful military says it is staying out of politics, and on Thursday the intelligence chief accused Khan of asking for "illegal and unconstitutional" support for his government. (Reuters)

China should stop its sabre-rattling against Taiwan and maintain peace and stability, the head of Taiwan's China-policy making Mainland Affairs Council said on Friday, as Beijing ramped up political and military pressure on the island it claimed as its own.

China has stepped up military activities near democratically governed Taiwan since August, when it conducted blockade drills around the island following a visit to Taipei by U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

"Beijing should stop its sabre-rattling as it only deepens the gap between the two sides and raises tensions in the region," Mainland Affairs Council minister Chiu Tai-san told a forum in Taipei.

"We urge mainland China to lay down arms and maintain peace and stability. The key to peace is to reverse the mindset of handling problems with force," Chiu said, adding Beijing should resolve disagreements with Taipei via "a constructive dialogue without preconditions."

Chiu said he hoped China could gradually relax its travel restrictions to control the COVID-19 pandemic so that the two sides could resume "healthy and orderly exchanges and create room for positive interaction."

China has repeatedly rebuffed offers for talks on the basis of equality with mutual respect by Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen, who Beijing views as a separatist.

China considers Taiwan its own territory. Earlier this month, President Xi Jinping said in a speech at the opening of a the Communist Party Congress in Beijing that it is up to the Chinese people to resolve the Taiwan issue and that China will never renounce the use of force over Taiwan.

Taipei says only the island's 23 million people can decide their future, and that as Taiwan has never been ruled by the People's Republic of China its sovereignty claims are void. (Reuters)

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy on Friday expressed doubt over Russia's declaration that its partial mobilisation was complete, saying the poor performance of pro-Moscow forces meant more men could be needed.

"Very soon Russia may need a new wave of people to send to the war," he said in a video address. Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu earlier said the call-up of 300,000 reservists to fight in Ukraine was complete. (Reuters)

Ecuador's energy minister Xavier Vera resigned on Friday amid an investigation into accusations he arranged jobs at state oil company Petroecuador in exchange for bribes.

"I'm taking a step to the side with the sole purpose of being able to concentrate entirely on defending the slander leveled against me," said Vera, who has denied wrongdoing, in a message published on the energy ministry's Twitter profile.

The former minister thanked President Guillermo Lasso for his support and said his resignation would avoid the government being bogged down by the accusations.

Vera was the vice minister of mining for 10 months and later appointed the minister for mines and energy, which he held for six months.

Late on Thursday the attorney general's office, which said this week it was launching a probe, searched Vera's homes in Quito and Guayaquil and his office in the ministry of energy, as well as a hotel in the capital where someone else involved in the case had stayed.

Items like telephones and computers which were seized in the searches "will be entered into the chain of custody, amid the investigation for an alleged crime of bribery," the office said on Twitter.

The investigation was sparked by allegations in a digital media outlet that Vera, who began his ministerial post in April, had arranged jobs at state oil company Petroecuador in exchange for payments, among other corruption accusations.

He told local media on Thursday there was no proof against him and that the accusations were a systematic effort by criminals to discredit the government.

"This is something orchestrated by the mafias which have always prowled around my sector, which drives 30% of GDP, and I'm a rock in their shoe," Vera told Sonorama radio. "This is not a coincidence, this is a systematic effort to affect the image of the government."

"There is no concrete case, there is no recording of me, there is no photo of me, there is no audio of me, there is no video of me," he added. (Reuters)