ISLAMABAD, Sept 27: H.K. Burki, one of Pakistan’s most prominent journalists, died at a private hospital in Islamabad on Saturday night after a prolonged illness. He was 82.

Family members said Mr Burki died at the Shifa International hospital where he was admitted on August 5 and underwent two major operations. For most of the time he remained in an intensive care unit on the life support system.

He was first operated upon on August 6 for what is medically called aortic aneurysm — dilatation of the large artery taking blood from the heart — and underwent a second operation for colostomy on August 17.

Besides a long and outstanding career in journalism, Mr Burki, born on November 10, 1920, had been an officer in the British Royal Indian Navy where he was a flotilla commander in the World War Two in Burma, and was a former Pakistan hockey captain.

Mr Burki, also an associate of the London-based Royal Photographic Society, remained a foreign correspondent in London and at the United Nations in New York first for the Civil and Military Gazette and then for The Pakistan Times.

As the diplomatic correspondent for The Pakistan Times, Mr Burki was known for his close association with the late prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto.

He is survived by a wife, two sons and a daughter.

Family said Mr Burki’s funeral would be taken out on Sunday from his home (House 28, Street 8, sector F-7/3) at 1.30pm and he would be buried at the Islamabad graveyard.