ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s right-wing Jamaat-e-Islami party’s head Naeem-ur-Rehman announced on Tuesday that the party has temporarily halted its “long march” to Islamabad temporarily, after Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif requested him to postpone the demonstration.

Thousands of JI supporters left via train from Karachi on Sunday to participate in a march to the capital. The party has been protesting against soaring fuel prices in Pakistan for the past one month via sit-in protests in Karachi, Lahore, Peshawar and other cities. It has urged the government to withdraw the petroleum levy and provide economic relief to the masses.

Sharif spoke to Rehman on Tuesday and urged him to postpone the protest, the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) said. Sharif, who is in New York to attend the 81st session of the UN General Assembly, told Rehman the government has been providing relief to people hit hardest by soaring fuel prices via its fuel subsidy plan.

Speaking to his supporters in Multan from where the party planned on marching toward Islamabad by road, Rehman announced the JI was not calling off its protest. However, he said the party was temporarily stopping its march in Multan, pending a meeting with Sharif after he returns from New York.

“If the prime minister provides relief in the meeting, it will be welcome,” Rehman said. “If there is a delay, the long march will proceed forward.”

Rehman said he wanted to give the government a chance to provide relief to the masses, clarifying that the JI did not have any vested interests for protesting.

He warned the government that the JI was not calling off its march and that its supporters would remain in Multan.

“You should know that the plans that we have made, ABC, according to them we won’t be entering Islamabad from one place alone,” he said.

Pakistan’s government levies Rs114 [$0.41] per liter in taxes and duties on petrol and Rs100 [$0.36] per liter on diesel. The government has regularly increased the prices of petroleum products as the US-Iran war and increasing attacks by the Houthis against Saudi Arabia drive up global oil prices.

The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) of former prime minister Imran Khan has also announced it will hold a protest march to the capital on Sept. 27. The PTI plans to mobilize hundreds of thousands of supporters in the capital to press for Khan’s release, who has remained incarcerated in prison since 2023.

Pakistani authorities have taken stringent security measures ahead of the planned marches, placing shipping containers to seal off the Red Zone area in Islamabad ahead of the protest. The area is home to Pakistan’s most important executive, legislative, and judicial buildings, and also features several foreign embassies.

Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi has warned protesters against taking the law into their hands.