Imran Khan rejects PM’s invitation to attend APC

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Secretary General Asad Umar Friday said the party chief Imran Khan would not attend the federal government’s All Parties Conference (APC) scheduled for February 7.

The statement of the PTI leader came as Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif confirmed the invitation he had extended to the PTI chief at an Apex Committee meeting in Peshawar.

During the Apex Committee meeting in Peshawar, PM Shehbaz, without naming the PTI chief, said: “I have also invited the person who does not want to even shake hands with me.

“All parties are invited to APC and Apex Committee meetings and I hope that it will not be rejected.

“We need to fight the menace of terrorism by setting our differences aside and move forward.”

Recalling his time as the opposition leader in the National Assembly, the premier said: “Whenever he [Imran Khan] wrote a letter to me, he never wrote my name on it, however, I always responded with my name and my signature on the letter.”

On the other hand, PTI leader Umar, while speaking to the press outside the Lahore High Court, said: “How can we sit with them [PDM-led government] while cases are being registered against us?”

“The Constitution is being violated by registering cases of treason against the opponents and all the government resources are devoted to arrests and detentions,” he told the media.

While mentioning the by-elections, he said: “Governors are not ready to provide the dates for the elections,” adding that 220 million people of Pakistan will not allow anyone to seize their rights.

The prime minister seeks to bring heads of all political parties to the table so they can join heads and figure out ways to address “important national challenges”.

The invitation was a major development as the PDM government and PTI have always been at loggerheads on almost all national issues, before Khan’s ouster from the PM’s Office.