Prime Minister Imran Khan lashed out at former premier Nawaz Sharif for maligning the top army leadership, implying the PML-N supremo himself was launched into politics through the help of the military establishment.
Khan’s remarks came during an animated address to a Tiger Force convention in Islamabad, in which he dismissed opposition’s power show of yesterday in Gujranwala as a “circus”.
Commenting on the speech given by PMLN supremo Nawaz Sharif during the opposition rally in Gujranwala, Prime Minister Khan said the PML-N leader was using inappropriate “language” against the army and ISI chiefs at a time when Pakistani soldiers were constantly sacrificing their lives for the nation.
While describing the prevailing geopolitical scenario, Khan said the government of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi hated Pakistan and Muslims “more than any other Indian government in the history of the subcontinent”.
“There are constant attacks on our soldiers; they are sacrificing their lives every day,” he said, noting that 20 security personnel were martyred in two attacks on Thursday.
“Why are they sacrificing their lives? For us; for the country. And this jackal (geedar) who ran with his tail between his legs used such language for the army chief and DG ISI,” he added, referring to Nawaz.
The prime minister said Nawaz had first become a minister through the patronage of Gen (retd) Ghulam Jilani and reached chief ministership by “polishing the boots of Gen Ziaul Haq”. He also accused the PML-N leader of having received “crores of rupees from Meeran Bank to fight elections against the PPP”, saying the ISI chief at the time had submitted a report in this regard to the Supreme Court.
“It is unfortunate that our country’s courts have always helped him. This is the man who put [PPP co-chairperson Asif Ali] Zardari in jail twice. It was Zardari who instituted the Hudaibiya Paper Mills case against him, not Gen [Qamar Javed] Bajwa.”
