ISLAMABAD: The government has resumed talks with the banned Tehreek-i-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP) along with influential clerics.
Almost all influential leaders were brought to Rawalpindi and Islamabad. A picture of Mufti Muneebur Rehman and Karachi-based industrialist Aqeel Karim Dhedi meeting Chief of the Army Staff Gen Qamar Bajwa kept circulating on social media.
Mufti Muneeb also met the outfit’s incarcerated leader Saad Rizvi in Islamabad.
Despite taking all measures against the banned outfit’s protest march, the government decided to resume talks and brought senior leaders of the organisation, already in the custody, to the federal capital in the early hours of Saturday morning.
Following these renewed efforts, the cabinet members also softened their tone, with Interior Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed, Information Minister Fawad Chaudhry and Adviser to the Prime Minister on Religious Harmony and Middle East Hafiz Tahir Ashrafi restrained from issuing statements against the banned outfit.
Sources said Saad Rizvi and three senior members of the TLP ‘Shura’ — Maulana Shafiq Amini, Engineer Hafezullah and Pir Inayatul Haq — were brought to Islamabad from Lahore for direct negotiations.
A senior TLP leader said negotiations were the only way forward and everybody wanted a way out of the current situation, however, the behaviour of some cabinet members was irresponsible.
“Why did they brand us Indian agent; the whole nation wants to know who is getting money from the enemies,” the TLP official, speaking from hiding, said, adding that, “we have asked the government to change the negotiating team which does not insult us after the meeting”.
Meanwhile, the TLP acknowledged the meeting in a press statement, saying that a meeting with the government team was held in Rawalpindi. In its second release issued late in the night, the TLP agreed to abide by all assurances it had given the government, including stopping the march in Wazirabad.
Meanwhile, the new negotiating team, led by Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi and comprising National Assembly Speaker Asad Qaiser and MNA Ali Mohammad Khan, met the TLP leaders.
In another development, a team of 19 senior clerics met Prime Minister Imran Khan at his Banigala residence.
