ISLAMABAD: Interior minister Rana Sanaullah said on Wednesday the government of Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif would not negotiate with ex-premier Imran Khan, calling him a “political terrorist.”
Khan is leading a political march to the capital in a bid to pressure the government to announce snap polls. Khan’s followers are piled onto trucks and cars in the convoy but many are also marching alongside on foot.
The march began last Friday and since then, there have been widespread reports of negotiations between Khan and the government and the all-powerful military to reach a solution to the ongoing political turmoil.
“We can talk with a politician,” Sanaullah said in comments to reporters at parliament. “He [Imran Khan] is not a politician. He is a political terrorist.”
When asked by a reporter if Khan’s convoy would be allowed to enter Islamabad, the interior minister said the “matter is subject to law and constitution,” adding that Khan and his party had to follow rules set by the courts to observe peaceful protest in specially designated areas of the capital.
Khan was removed from office in a parliamentary vote of no-confidence in April, which he blamed, and continues to blame, on a conspiracy hatched by the United States with Khan’s rivals in Pakistan, including current PM Sharif. Both deny the charge but Khan has held rallies across the country since, sticking to the theory of a foreign conspiracy and challenging the mandate of the Sharif government and calling for early elections.
The ex-PM last held a protest march to the capital in May but called it off after his supporters and police clashed on the streets of Islamabad.
