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PAKISTAN’S GOVERNMENT IS trying to reopen talks with opposition groups after bloody overnight clashes between police and protesters outside the prime minister’s residence left two dead and hundreds injured.
By this morning sporadic clashes were continuing between police in riot gear and a few hundred protesters, as thousands more lay on the grass and slept.
Many protesters had come armed with batons and slingshots.
Tear gas
Several vehicles stood torched and hundreds of tear gas canisters lay strewn on the ground on Islamabad’s normally pristine Constitution Avenue following more than 12 hours of battle.
Thousands of followers of politician Imran Khan and firebrand cleric Tahir ul Qadri have been camped outside parliament since August 15 demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, triggering a crisis that has raised the spectre of military intervention.
Opposition groups — who claim the 2013 election which swept Sharif to power was rigged — tried to storm the prime minister’s offical residence last night, using cranes to remove barricades.
Information minister Pervaiz Rashid said today the government remained open to restarting negotiations to end the situation peacefully.
“The government did not initiate the clashes. They turned violent and tried to enter sensitive government buildings, which are the symbol of the state,” he told the private Geo News channel.
They wanted their demands to be met at gunpoint but still, our doors are open for talks.
A Qadri follower who identified himself as Aziz complained: “This is democracy, this is democracy in Pakistan.”
It is more dangerous than military dictatorship, they don’t allow people to make peaceful protests.
Addressing supporters earlier, former cricket hero Khan said: “I will not leave my people alone and keep fighting until we secure a real independence for Pakistan.”
“The Sharif brothers have a lust for power. They are not sincere with the people or the country.
“We will get their resignations and put them in jail,” Khan said, referring also to the prime minister’s brother who is chief minister of Punjab state.
Neither Khan nor Qadri led their protests from the front, though Khan later tweeted a picture of himself standing on top of a shipping container which he said was being shelled by tear gas.
Military intervention?
The Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) reported two deaths — one man hit by a rubber bullet and another who died of a heart attack.
More than 400 injured, including dozens of women and a handful of children, were rushed to the city’s two major hospitals, PIMS and Poly Clinic. At least 79 police were among the wounded.
Crisis
The crisis took on a new dimension on Thursday after it was announced the country’s powerful army chief General Raheel Sharif would mediate.
Observers believe that if PM Sharif survives the crisis it will be at the cost of significant concessions to the army — including allowing ex-army chief Pervez Musharraf, currently on trial for treason, to leave the country.
But political analyst Mosharraf Zaidi said the protests had become difficult to contain and the opposition could be trying to get the military more directly involved.
“The single objective is to force Sharif to resign and possibly force the military to intervene,” he said.
Zaidi also dismissed claims by the protest groups that they had not initiated the violence.
“You cannot build up emotions nationwide, but particularly (outside parliament), for 17 days — you cannot say ‘I want my tigers in the front and my women in the back’ – you cannot be in attack formation and then claim you had no role in fomenting this violence,” he said.
The protest leaders have drawn thousands to the streets of Islamabad, but their call has not mobilised mass support in a country of 180 million people.
But many of the protesters are now openly calling for the military — which has ruled Pakistan for half its existence — to return to power.
Sharif, for his part, has vowed to stay on.
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Imagine how much we could increase the wages of nurses, teachers and gardaí if we didn’t piss away $9billion on housing economic migrants and NGOs.
@Tom Barry: they prefer looking after economic migrants more than there own citizens nowadays it is actually disgraceful tbh even more so on people who keep voting these in we really need a government that looks after our own PROBLEMS first and foremost before they start looking after everybody else simple
@Happy As Larry: Be sure to let us know once our own problems are sorted so that we can move on to other pressing matters
@Happy As Larry: It’s an awful pity a lot of ‘our own’ can’t look after themselves…..full employment and there are still huge numbers that couldn’t be bothered working and want to be looked after from the cradle to the grave….also never mind the live register of unemployment,the won’t work/will never work are not on those numbers.
@SYaxJ2Ts: Hi Kev, is it really the states duty to deal with any issues except it’s own? Charity should be up to the public, spending there own money as they chose and if that’s to help others less well off in other countries, fair play. Charity should not be something that is mandated by the state at the tax payers expense.
@John Terry: i completely agree, dublin teens openin their legs and bang free gaf, then they move the father of the future sponge in and still claim single parents along with rent, elecy, gas allowances and money to spend for the week on top of that, i know one getting over 600 a week AFTER her rent and bills are paid as a lone parent with the father of the baby living with ber
@he didnt take the 120k because he already got it s: ….lol,so it’s only Dublin teens?….
@John Terry: how can there be full employment AND huge numbers of people not working… the makes absolutely no sense. It’s one or the other
Sounds like the Government is dragging its feet in the hope that inflation falls further soon.
Inflation may be coming down Éamon Ryan but prices are not, so don’t see how you maintain its good, people’s wages did not go up in line with inflation
@andy murphy: someone is clueless about economics lol
Wow! I’m shocked, this government wouldn’t lie straight in the bed. What a shower of wasters!
Nothing short of disgraceful inflation reduction has very little to do with gov policy but suddenly a bargaining tool that was not used in the last talks shame on you
Having negotiated salary increases over the last two years that were way behind inflation the unions are once again playing a blinder in helping the govt reduce people’s wages in real terms. Would be really interesting to see if these union negotiators end up being rewarded in the future with payments from govt in the form of board positions on various quangos. The old imno head retired on a pension way above what nurses get and was also rewarded with payed seat on a lucrative quango for those on it. This for ensuring nurses pay kept well below what it should be, Sile is carrying on where he left off
It is depressing to see people who post blaming immigrants for all our ills. Dragging out wage negotiations for public service workers was going on for years, long before we had the large number of immigrants.
Journal is a joke you can’t leave a comment on a serious issue graham lennihan is mostly correct why can’t we say it like it is im a male I wasn’t sure as I child I had to become happy with life allow children to develop and decide stop this pressure
@Philip Johnson: and yet here you are, leaving a comment that your claiming your not allowed to make
@Philip Johnson: GL is even less correct than your English.
Any pay increases should be tied to serious reform of working practices/contracts and especially accountability. The quality of our public services vs the money we pump into it is dismal.
Pantomime……
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