ISPR condemns Imran’s ‘baseless’ allegations against serving military officer

The Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) on Monday condemned Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan’s “highly irresponsible and baseless allegations” against a serving senior military officer and asked him to make recourse on legal forums instead of levelling “false allegations,” Aaj News reported.

In a statement, the military’s media affairs wing said that the PTI chairman made “fabricated and malicious allegations” against a senior military officer without evidence.

“This has been a consistent pattern for last one year wherein military and intelligence agencies officials are targeted with insinuations and sensational propaganda for the furtherance of political objectives,” the ISPR said, and termed them as “extremely unfortunate, deplorable and unacceptable.”

“We ask the political leader concerned to make recourse to legal avenues and stop making false allegations,” the statement said, adding that the institution reserves the right to take legal action against patently false and malafide statements and propaganda.

The statement comes a day after Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif condemned Imran Khan’s allegations against Major General Faisal Naseer.

“Imran Niazi’s act of routinely maligning and threatening Pakistan Army and Intelligence Agency for the sake of petty political gains is highly condemnable,” the premier said in a tweet.

He said such allegations against Major Gen Faisal Naseer and officers of our intelligence agency “cannot be allowed and will not be tolerated.”

Imran hit back at PM Shehbaz, asking if he did not have the right to nominate those he felt were behind the assassination plot.

“Why was I denied my legal and constitutional right to register an FIR?” he asked.

“Does SS [Shehbaz Sharif’s] tweet mean military officers are above the law or that they cannot commit a crime? If we allege one of them has committed a crime, how is the institution being maligned?” he questioned.

Meanwhile, PTI’s senior vice president Fawad Chaudhry termed the ISPR statement as “shocking”, and called for an independent investigation into Imran’s allegations.

“If Imran Khan believes that any officer is involved in the murderous attack on him, [then] he should be satisfied through an independent and transparent investigation that this is not the case.”

Fawad said with such a press release, the institution is telling that they are above the law. “Such behaviour is destructive for nations.”