Pakistan’s government and opposition groups made little headway in overnight talks aimed at dispersing protesters seeking the fall of the prime minister, as their negotiations entered a fourth day yesterday.
Cricketer-turned-politician Imran Khan and populist cleric Tahir-ul-Qadri have led thousands of supporters demonstrating outside the legislature this week calling for Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to go.
A government delegation met Qadri’s team early yesterday to discuss the demands of the cleric’s Pakistan Awami Tehreek (PAT) movement, but the PAT came away dissatisfied.
Photo: EPA
“We believe in [the] dialogue process, but it seems the government team did not come with a clear mandate,” Rahiq Abbasi, a member of Qadri’s team, told reporters after the talks.
“We don’t think they are serious in carrying forward the process,” he added.
Their talks were again dominated by the issue of the alleged murder of at least 10 PAT workers in clashes with police in Lahore in June, for which Qadri wants arrests made and a legal case launched.
Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI) held their own talks with the government late on Friday, which proved equally fruitless.
Those talks came hours after the PTI, the third-largest party in the Pakistani National Assembly, submitted the resignations of their 34 lawmakers in the assembly to the parliament’s speaker.
The letters are to be opened and verified tomorrow, speaker Ayaz Sadiq told private Geo television, ultimately triggering by-elections unless they are withdrawn.
PTI vice chairman Shah Mehmood Qureshi told reporters the next round of talks would be held later on Saturday.
Khan insists that May last year’s general election, which swept Sharif to power in a landslide, was rigged and therefore the prime minister should step down, though observers rated the vote free and credible.
Ahsan Iqbal, a government minister and member of its negotiating team, claimed meetings with the two groups had made progress, without elaborating, and added: “We have agreed the talks will continue.”
Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League-N (PML-N) party insist he will not quit and accuse the protesters of undermining the country’s fragile democracy.
Qadri and Khan’s protest movements are not formally allied and have different goals, beyond toppling the government. However, their combined pressure — and numbers — have given extra heft to the rallies.
If one group were to reach a settlement with the government and withdraw, the other’s position would be significantly weakened.
The standoff has raised fears of possible military intervention in the country, which has seen three coups since its creation in 1947.
However, analysts say the army is more likely to use the crisis to assert influence behind the scenes than stage an outright power grab.
Neither movement has mobilized mass support beyond their core followers, and opposition parties have shunned Khan’s call to unseat the government and begin a campaign of civil disobedience.
Despite rumors that the military had some hand in the protests, Pakistani Minister for Water and Power Abid Sher Ali, a PML-N stalwart, insisted there was “no pressure on us from any state institution to resign.”
“It is the imagination of some lawless and outside elements camping out there,” he said.
However, if a full-blown coup d’etat looks unlikely — such a move could jeopardize billions of dollars in foreign assistance and trade deals — analysts say the crisis will leave Sharif weakened.
“The protests rocking Islamabad threaten to upend the constitutional order, set back rule of law and open the possibility of a soft coup, with the military ruling through the back door,” the International Crisis Group wrote.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese
RIVER TRAGEDY: Local fishers and residents helped rescue people after the vessel capsized, while motorbike taxis evacuated some of the injured At least 58 people going to a funeral died after their overloaded river boat capsized in the Central African Republic’s (CAR) capital, Bangui, the head of civil protection said on Saturday. “We were able to extract 58 lifeless bodies,” Thomas Djimasse told Radio Guira. “We don’t know the total number of people who are underwater. According to witnesses and videos on social media, the wooden boat was carrying more than 300 people — some standing and others perched on wooden structures — when it sank on the Mpoko River on Friday. The vessel was heading to the funeral of a village chief in