PTI to hold talks with army chief, ISI DG soon: Shehryar Afridi

ISLAMABAD: After calls were made recently to initiate a new round of reconciliation talks, PTI senior leader Shehryar Afridi has claimed that his party will hold “dialogue with Chief of Army Staff and Director General of Inter-Services Intelligence soon” instead of talking to “rejected people” who reached the parliament through Form 47.

Afridi made the statement while speaking to Shahzad Iqbal in the Geo News programme Naya Pakistan when asked about ways to put the country on the path of political stability.

Slamming the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PMLN) led government, the PTI stalwart alleged that the incumbent rulers are a bunch of “rejected people” who are being “controlled through a remote” and reached parliament via “Form 47”. He also alleged that the ruling parties were “supported by the establishment”.

Responding to new calls for reconciliation, he said that there was no benefit for the former ruling party to hold dialogue with the “people rejected by the nation”.

He went on to say that PTI founder Imran Khan and Pakistan are inseparable while his opponents faced a humiliating defeat in the February 8 nationwide general elections despite committing “worst rigging”. The incumbent rulers need moral power to step down after accepting that they did not get votes from the nation, he added.

“My leader doesn’t want any NRO. We want dialogue for betterment of Pakistan,” Afridi said, adding that Khan wants to engage all stakeholders for a better country but he did not receive any response. He clarified the PTI was neither going against the national interests nor the military and other state institutions. The former federal minister also claimed that the party would soon hold talks with the army chief and top spy. However, he did not disclose any further details nor any other party leader seconded his statement.