Three options given by Army, not Imran: Mazari

ISLAMABAD: A day after the ISPR DG’s press conference, former PTI minister for human rights Shireen Mazari has publicly disputed Maj-Gen Babar Iftikhar’s statement regarding the military high command’s meeting with former prime minister Imran Khan the week before his ouster, and the matter of the ‘three options’.

In a tweet on Friday, Mazari said that it was the military that had approached Imran Khan, via former PTI minister Pervez Khattak, and not the other way around: “Let me be clear — I am stating on record [that the] PM did not call [the military] for help on ‘breaking [the political] deadlock’. The [military] sought the [meeting through] Def Minister Khattak and they put forward the [three] proposals of either PM resigning or taking part in VNC or fresh elections!”

Calling the idea that the former PM had given the three options “absurd”, Mazari also asked why he would do that since he had already called the vote of no-confidence part of a “foreign regime change conspiracy”, and had stated “categorically and repeatedly” that he would never resign. “Makes no sense’, tweeted Mazari.

While Pervez Khattak has not commented on the matter, on Friday night, former minister for planning Asad Umar on being asked by a TV show to comment on the DG ISPR’s version regarding the meeting, said that Imran Khan had not given the three options during his meeting with the military top command.

Umar, however, did not comment further on the issue, saying the meeting was held behind closed doors. The issue of the army-Imran Khan meeting has been going on since before Imran Khan’s ouster, the former prime minister having claimed in a TV interview a week before his ouster that he had a meeting with the military leadership and had been given the three options. Khan had said he had not contacted the military himself but that he would not know if someone from his party had.

The issue came to surface once again on Thursday, at a press conference by DG ISPR Maj-Gen Babar Iftikhar, during which the DG had said that the military establishment had not initiated a meeting with former prime minister Imran Khan or put forth options before him.

And that in fact it was the Prime Minister’s Office that had contacted the military leadership to resolve the political deadlock. “The political parties were not ready for talks with each other to end the deadlock at that time... The army chief and DG ISI visited the PM’s Office at their request to play the role of mediator.”

Maj-Gen Babar Iftikhar spoke of ‘three options’ that were discussed in the meeting with Imran Khan: the vote of no-confidence, PM’s resignation, or dissolution of assemblies after withdrawal of the motion. He added that the then-prime minister had declared the third option as “acceptable” but that the opposition, on being conveyed this by the military leadership, had refused the third option. The DG ISPR had also clarified that none of the options given were from the military establishment.

Speaking to Aaj Shahzeb Khanzada Kay Saath on Friday night, the PML-N’s Rana Sanullah said that the PDM only found out about the meeting through media reports, and that once the military leadership contacted [the PDM], the then-opposition did ask if these options were coming from the establishment to which they were told that the military neither had an opinion on the matter nor any option to offer and was just playing the role of a messenger since the government and the opposition were not even ready to talk to each other.

Responding to Shireen Mazari’s tweet, journalist Hamid Mir tweeted that: “Pervez Khattak contacted military leadership on March 30th and requested for a meeting with [Imran Khan]. Army Chief and DG ISI went to see [the] ex-PM and he asked for NRO from [the] opposition. He gave three options. Army leaders conveyed three options to [the] opposition which were ‘rejected’”.