ISLAMABAD — A second round of talks between Pakistan’s government and the opposition ended in deadlock in the early hours of Sunday, with the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) saying its long march toward Islamabad will proceed as planned on October 4, according to Dawn.
The hours-long meeting at Parliament House, chaired by National Assembly Speaker Sardar Ayaz Sadiq, was aimed at defusing the political crisis surrounding the PTI’s planned protest march. Senate Opposition Leader Allama Raja Nasir Abbas confirmed shortly before 3 a.m. that the talks had failed to produce a breakthrough, the report said.
Opposition members said the discussions stalled over allowing jailed former prime minister Imran Khan to meet his personal physicians, visitation requests involving Khan and his wife Bushra Bibi, and the handling of terrorism in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, the PTI-ruled province from which the march will depart.
PPP leader Sherry Rehman, who represented the government side, noted that a draft agreement was altered four times after an initial consensus was reached, according to the report. PTI interim chairman Barrister Gohar Khan said after the talks that the party’s October 4 protest march remains intact and will proceed, adding that emergency measures or governor’s rule were not appropriate solutions.
The government has asked the PTI to call off the march, saying it will not allow protesters to enter Islamabad and that any matters relating to the courts, including Khan’s release, must be decided through the judicial system. Earlier media reports claiming the two sides had reached a written agreement were not confirmed by either delegation.
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Chief Minister Sohail Afridi has published a multi-day itinerary for the caravan, which is to set off on October 4 from Gandi Chowk in Lakki Marwat and pass through Karak, Kohat, Peshawar and Charsadda, with participants gathering at Khairabad on October 8, according to the report.
Ahead of the march, authorities blocked major highways into the capital with shipping containers and deployed tens of thousands of security personnel, Reuters reported on September 25. The deployment of Rangers personnel in Islamabad and parts of Punjab has since been extended until October 15, at the request of the Islamabad chief commissioner and the Punjab Home Department, according to local media reports.
Khan, 73, who was ousted in a 2022 no-confidence vote, has been in jail since 2023 and describes himself as a political prisoner. The PTI had postponed the march from September 27 to October 4; the party says the protest seeks his release and what it describes as the restoration of constitutional supremacy. Authorities have detained three of Khan’s sisters and hundreds of party activists in recent days, citing the need to maintain public order.
