Dialogue door not shut yet, Khawaja Asif tells PTI

SIALKOT: Days before the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s (PTI) planned nationwide protests, Defence Minister Khawaja Asif said on Sunday that the federal government’s offer for dialogue with the Imran Khan-founded party still stands.

“From our side, the dialogue offer to PTI is still intact,” said the defence minister during his interaction with journalists in Sialkot on Sunday. Last week, the incarcerated PTI founder called on his supporters to march to Islamabad on November 24. “Imran Khan says this is the final call for a [anti-government] protest. The PTI founder has stressed that the party’s entire leadership will be part of the march,” said his lawyer Faisal Chaudhry following a meeting in Adiala jail.

Khan has been behind bars since August last year after he was sentenced in the Toshakhana case and subsequently sentenced in other cases.

Referring to the former ruling party’s recent protest marches towards Islamabad, Asif said that the PTI, under the leadership of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Chief Minister Ali Amin Gandapur, attacked the Federation twice. The PTI held two protest rallies headed by KP firebrand CM in the federal capital in September and October amid riots and clashes with the police.

Mocking the KP CM, the minister said: “CM Ali Amin Gandapur ran away and left protesting workers abandoned. In the October march, Gandapur went missing after entering the KP House in the federal capital. After a mysterious day-long disappearance, he resurfaced in the KP Assembly and addressed lawmakers. His whereabouts remained unknown for over 30 hours after PTI tried to stage a protest in Islamabad.

“In September, the CM had also went missing during the protests in Islamabad. This time he reached Peshawar after being “missing” for hours in the wake of a crackdown against the PTI leadership over alleged violation of law in relation to the party’s rally in Islamabad, with sources saying that Gandapur was busy in meetings in the federal capital after the party’s power show.” Responding to a question, the minister said the PTI leadership should bring their children to the protests if it was a matter of “do or die”. “The PTI founder only wants dialogue with the establishment,” said the defence minister, claiming that leaders within the PTI were performing the role of “double agent”.