ISLAMABAD: Former prime minister and Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) leader Shahid Khaqan Abbasi has urged Prime Minister Imran Khan to share a letter — that he claimed during the PTI’s March 27 rally contained evidence of a “foreign-funded conspiracy” to topple his government — with parliamentarians and National Security Council (NSC).
Addressing a press conference in Islamabad, the former premier demanded that a session of parliament be called “immediately” tomorrow (Wednesday) and the “written threat” be shared with parliamentarians.
Talking about the written threat, Abbasi equated PM Imran’s claim to a threat to Pakistan and further demanded that all diplomatic relations be broken with the country that had “threatened Pakistan” through the letter and its envoy be expelled. “This is how a sovereign country reacts when it is threatened,” he added.
Referring to Asad Umar and Fawad Chaudhry’s media briefing earlier in the day, he said, “The opposition has grave concerns over some of the details shared by the premier and his ministers and there is a need to get to the bottom of these matters.”
“If the prime minister is speaking the truth, then this is how you should act and if not, come to parliament and apologise,” Abbasi added.
Talking about PM Imran’s March 27 speech, Abbasi said: “He (PM Imran) was crying about receiving threats. This is a reality that the prime minister of a nation of 230 million Muslims waved a paper and said he had been receiving threats.”
“Threats are not made to a prime minister but a country,” he remarked. Therefore, he said, he was demanding that a session of parliament be convened on an immediate basis tomorrow and the letter be shared with parliamentarians.
“If this is a secretive matter, an in-camera session should be held,” Abbasi continued, adding that parliamentarians should be told which country had dared to threaten Pakistan.
“No one had dared to do so in our 74-year-long history,” he said, asking, “Are we so weak now that we are being threatened through a letter?”
The prime minister, he said, should come to the parliament tomorrow and tell parliamentarians who had threatened Pakistan. “We are with him in this regard. We are with him on this for the remaining six days for which he will remain the prime minister”, he added.
Abbasi said if the government would not show the letter now, “it will be shown after April 4. It will be published in newspapers”.
He added that the government should not put the country’s foreign policy at stake to stay in power and if a threat had been made, the matter should be raised in the National Security Committee and parliament.
“We will fight these external dangers together, but if you are lying, you will have to answer to the nation. The decision is yours. Either [share the letter] in parliament or apologise,” Abbasi said.
