Senior Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) leader\u00a0Shah Mahmood Qureshi on Friday clarified that former PTI leader Fawad Chaudhry had visited him at the hospital only to enquire about his health, stressing that he remained\u00a0bound by the party\u2019s official policy.<\/p>\n
Qureshi, who has been acquitted in multiple\u00a0May 9 cases\u00a0while several other PTI leaders have been sentenced, made the remarks during an informal interaction with journalists inside a courtroom. The former foreign minister is currently incarcerated in Lahore’s Kot Lakpat jail in connection to other cases.<\/p>\n
Chaudhry and other\u00a0ex-PTI leaders had\u00a0met Qureshi\u00a0at a hospital in November, where, they said\u00a0the latter had\u00a0endorsed their efforts to lower the political temperature.<\/p>\n
Responding to a question about\u00a0Chaudhry\u00a0meeting him, Qureshi said they had both belonged to the same political party. He explained that Chaudhry first visited him at the hospital to check on his health and later came to his home as a guest. \u201cYou don\u2019t ask a guest why they came to see you,\u201d he remarked.<\/p>\n
When asked if he supported Chaudhry\u2019s proposed\u00a0National Dialogue Committee, Qureshi said that as the PTI\u2019s vice chairman, he could not deviate from the party\u2019s official stance.<\/p>\n
However, he added that the country’s stakeholders\u00a0needed to reflect on how ongoing political deadlock could be resolved. \u201cAfter resistance, reconciliation ultimately follows,\u201d he said, stressing that meaningful dialogue was the only way for the country to move forward.<\/p>\n
Qureshi noted that PTI founder Imran Khan had authorised opposition leader Mahmood Khan Achakzai to handle negotiations, adding that the latter was better placed to decide the future course of action. \u201cWe are in jail and have limited access to information,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Commenting on regional affairs, Qureshi said Pakistan had provided significant assistance to Afghanistan in the past but stressed that Islamabad\u2019s demand that Afghan soil not be used against Pakistan was legitimate.<\/p>\n
He added that Afghanistan\u2019s prosperity and stability were closely linked to Pakistan, saying Kabul would need to maintain positive relations with Islamabad if it sought long-term stability. \u201cWe want peace, and Afghanistan should stand with us against terrorism,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Qureshi further stated that the situation along the Iran border was currently under control.<\/p>\n
Referring to regional security, he said Pakistan had defeated India in combat and that \u201cGod\u00a0granted us honour\u201d, while cautioning that the threat from India had not yet fully subsided.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Senior Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) leader\u00a0Shah Mahmood Qureshi on Friday clarified that former PTI leader Fawad Chaudhry had visited him at the hospital only to enquire about his health, stressing that he remained\u00a0bound by the party\u2019s official policy. Qureshi, who has been acquitted in multiple\u00a0May 9 cases\u00a0while several other PTI leaders have been sentenced, made the …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1015,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1010","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1010","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1010"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1010\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1018,"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1010\/revisions\/1018"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1015"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1010"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1010"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1010"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}