RAWALPINDI: Amid the prevailing uncertainty surrounding the ongoing dialogue between the government and the Pakistan Thereek-e-Insaf (PTI), Imran Khan has given his party the green light to resume talks and submit written demands. “The PTI founder ordered the talks to continue and gave permission to submit both demands [of the party] in writing to the government committee,” PTI Chairman Barrister Gohar Ali Khan said while talking to the media outside Adiala Jail. The development comes as PTI leaders – including Barrister Gohar, Ali Zafar and Sher Afzal Marwat – met the former prime minister in a courtroom at the Adiala facility in Rawalpindi. The development is likely to reduce uncertainty over the future of the PTI government’s ongoing negotiations, which have been marred by uncertainty in recent days due to the former ruling party’s inability to stand up to its entrenched base and present its written demands. For days, the PTI claimed that the Adiala jail authorities did not allow them to meet Khan and linked it to the prospect of submitting a writ petition. The two sides held two meetings on 27 December 2024 and 2 January 2025 after months of political back-and-forth. However, PTI’s failure to submit written demands and meet Khan ultimately put the future of talks in doubt as it led to a stalemate with the government insisting on the former. During the latest meeting between the government and PTI’s negotiating committees, both sides decided that the Khan-founded party would present its charter of demands in the next meeting after meeting the jailed prime minister. It was also decided that the third round of talks would be called after the PTI committee met Khan. The former ruling party reiterated its call for the release of its founder and workers and the creation of a judicial commission into the events of the May 9 riots and last year’s November 26 protests. Barrister Gohar, speaking about the future of talks with the government, said the party would now put its demands in writing. Asked about the negotiation committee’s meeting with Khan, the PTI chairman said the former prime minister told them to hold one more round of talks if they were not allowed to meet him. However, he noted that the PTI founder was of the view that the talks could not progress further if the party’s negotiators could meet him now. The PTI chief stressed that he did not want negotiations on the issue of written demands to be derailed and recalled that they had established good contact with the government before November 2024. However, he complained that the matter did not move forward after that. . Advocate Gohar also ruled out the possibility of Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi or anyone else demanding Khan’s release and clarified that there was no discussion to move him anywhere else. “PTI founder said they would welcome any invitation from any country,” Gohar noted “[However] we have said ‘absolutely not’ to the United States before, if there is interference, we will say so in the future,” he added. Separately, the Anti-Terrorism Court (ATC), in a hearing at Adiala jail, approved Khan’s request for a medical examination and allowed him to speak to his sons.
