Defense Minister Khawaja Muhammad Asif praised the military’s decision to keep its distance from domestic politics on Wednesday, calling it a wise move.
Ironically, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf Chairman Imran Khan was seeking the backing of the military forces, he stated during a news conference. Under totalitarian regimes, politicians struggled for democracy for forty years.
The minister claimed that Imran Khan simultaneously criticised state institutions for purportedly not supporting him, which revealed his hypocrisy.
He claimed that in his speech at the political gathering in Taxila, the PTI leader disparaged the institutions as has become customary over the previous five months. He allegedly spoke out against the Pakistan Army and the ruling class, but the released tape shows him instructing party leaders to alter the meeting minutes in order to manipulate the cypher without mentioning the United States.
Imran Khan “should have showed some respect for the state institutions, but he instead acted in the contrary,” according to Khawaja Asif. He based his “foreign plot” claim on the notion that Shehbaz Sharif should have taken Imran’s position as prime minister, but this did not happen.
Exactly what Imran had said at the Taxila meeting was read out by him: “If your home is burglarized and the watchman claims to be impartial. Should he be left alone?”
He lamented that the PTI head used “uncalled words” for state institutions in the aforementioned speech.
The minister stated that the government was closely investigating the situation and will take legal measures against Imran Khan for defaming state institutions. He said that the institutions were created to protect the nation, not the interests of “thieves like Imran Khan who came into power.”
“The entire nation supports them,” he continued, “and the military services have made enormous sacrifices in the battle against terror that has no precedence in the world.”
Imran Khan, he claimed, had taken an oath (as prime minister) to uphold the Constitution, yet he was giving conflicting accounts of it.
Asif Khawaja claimed, “Imran Khan first admitted to possessing a copy of the cypher, but he now says he is unaware of it. He kept it in his possession, but he is now deceiving the public. In all of my political experience, I have never encountered a politician who criticises his funders and bites the hand that feeds him “said he.
However, he said, the same Imran Khan was pleading with the establishment for forgiveness behind the scenes.
The minister claimed that Imran Khan was “afraid of November” because his plans for a second 5-year term in office had been thwarted by the separation of state institutions from politics.
He said that terrorists were operating in the northern regions and that the military forces were making sacrifices to combat the threat of extremism. The country must support the military forces as they wage a low-intensity battle against terrorism.
Similarly, he said that although major NGOs were active in flood-affected areas, the chief ministers of Sindh and Balochistan were on the ground, and the prime minister was also making trips there, Imran Khan was nowhere to be found.
In response to questions, he stated that he had two experiences with the selection of the army commander and that the procedure had previously begun by the end of October or the beginning of November.
“As prime minister, Nawaz Sharif had established a precedent that the departing army commander should have a dignified exit and have adequate time for farewell conversations with his staff and the troops he had led.
He said that the debate around General Qamar Javed Bajwa’s retirement problem was resolved by his comments in the US.
In response to APP’s query, the minister stated that in official conversations between diplomats, information that was not to be discussed in public was sent using cyphers.
After interacting with dignitaries overseas, our diplomats transmit their impressions via cyphers. By making such a highly classified document public, Imran Khan broke both the Official Secret Act and the country’s security, he said.
The minister said that the government wanted to take tough measures against Imran Khan so that he could not evade the law when asked whether the PTI chairman was facing any legal action. He made it plain that they didn’t have a personal vendetta against him, though.
