Imran Khan was addressing the rally of PTI. (file)
Lahore, Pakistan:
Former Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan has alleged that top ISI officer Major General Faisal Naseer, who tried to kill him twice, was also involved in the brutal murder of senior journalist Arshad Sharif.
Khan’s remarks came when he was addressing a rally in Lahore from his bullet-bomb-proof vehicle. The rally was telecast live in other cities through video link.
“Major-General Faisal Naseer of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) tried to kill me twice. He is also involved in the murder of (TV anchor) Arshad Sharif. He also nailed my party’s Senator Azam Swati and Gave him severe tortures to him,” Pakistan-Tehreek-e-Insaf chief Khan said.
Arshad Sharif, who was critical of the military, was killed in Kenya last October after he fled the country citing threats to his life from security agencies.
The killing of an investigative journalist by police in Kenya has sparked outrage in Pakistan.
Kenyan police said in their preliminary report that the 49-year-old man was shot dead in a moving vehicle in a case of mistaken identity.
Khan (71) had earlier accused Gen Naseer, along with Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and Interior Minister Rana Sanaullah, of attempting to assassinate him in Wazirabad in Punjab province in November last year, in which he was shot three times in the leg.
“This man (Gen Naseer) is involved in atrocities against people of my party since last 20 months but no one in his organization cares about it. No one who loves Pakistan can do what this man does. Has been,” said the cricketer-turned-cricketer. -The politician said, indirectly asking the current army chief General Asim Munir why he does not take action against this ISI personnel.
The PTI chief asked the country to take to the streets against “mafia rulers and their masters (elements in the military establishment)”.
He said, “Despite these assassination plans, I am protesting on the streets for the sake of this country. It is your duty to support me, because this is not politics, but jihad – the fight for real freedom is never politics.”
Khan said his party would organize rallies from next week till May 14 demanding elections in Punjab.
He said that if Sup~check~rem court is disregarded, consti~check~Tuition will drop. Khan insisted, “This means the end of the rule of law and the beginning of the law of the jungle. We will not allow this to happen.”
The ousted prime minister also questioned what Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif was doing in the UK.
Shahbaz Sharif traveled to Britain to attend the coronation of King Charles III and Queen Camilla.
Khan said, “Shahbaz is there because his wealth is accumulated in the UK. His children are abroad. This country is just a means of entertainment for his family.”
He also criticized Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari for visiting India to attend a summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO).
Khan asked what was the benefit of the visit to India.
He said, “Pakistan has been defamed in the world.”
External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar launched an aggressive attack against Bhutto-Zardari in his address at the SCO meeting, contradicting Pakistan’s foreign minister’s statement that terrorism should not be a “weapon for diplomatic point-scoring”. Seen as directed in India.
At a press conference hours later, S Jaishankar said that Bhutto-Zardari’s statement on the weaponization of terrorism inadvertently revealed a mindset.
The foreign minister accused his Pakistani counterpart of being a “promoter, enabler and spokesperson of a terrorist industry”.
“As foreign minister of an SCO member state, Bhutto-Zardari was treated accordingly. As an enabler, justifyer and spokesman for a terrorism industry that is Pakistan’s mainstay, his positions called for They were and are opposed, including at the SCO meeting itself,” he said.
Imran Khan criticized S Jaishankar for his remarks and said: “Pakistan’s foreign minister should have calculated the cost-benefit ratio before embarking on this diplomatically risky visit.” However, Bhutto-Zardari termed their visit as “successful” as they pleaded their country’s case on Indian soil.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)