By Staff Reporter
ISLAMABAD: The main opposition Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party fired back on Tuesday at accusations from the military’s chief spokesman that its policies in the restive Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province had fostered a surge in terrorism, dismissing the claims as politically motivated and a threat to democratic norms.
The rebuttal came hours after Maj. Gen. Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry, the director general of the Inter-Services Public Relations, held a news conference in which he attributed 80 percent of the country’s terrorist incidents to the province, blaming what he called a “politically permissive environment” and an emerging “nexus between political and militant elements.”
He singled out the party’s leadership, playing video clips of senior figures, including the provincial chief minister, Sohail Afridi, and displaying screenshots of statements from the party’s founder, Imran Khan, to question their stance on counterterrorism.
In a series of statements and social media posts, Tehreek-e-Insaf leaders accused the military of overstepping into politics and ignoring the province’s long history of sacrifices in the fight against extremism. The party highlighted its record during Khan’s tenure as prime minister, noting that Pakistan had climbed four spots in the Global Terrorism Index to ninth place, only to plummet to second in the ensuing three and a half years. “Attempts were being made to cast doubt on PTI, despite the fact that under its government, Pakistan had improved four ranks in the Global Terrorism Index, moving to ninth place,” the party said in a post on X.
It added that the spokesman’s remarks ridiculed a provincial leader who had made significant sacrifices against terrorism amid ongoing threats to the country. Describing the military briefings as “two back-to-back political press conferences,” the party said they had been met with widespread rejection from Pakistanis, who countered with archival clips and data.
Aleema Khan, jailed Khan’s sister, called the linkage of terrorism to provincial policies “shameful,” asking, “Which of our people are supporting terrorism? It is not right to speak this way about patriotic Pakistanis.” Salman Akram Raja, the party’s secretary general, rejected the allegation of a political-criminal nexus behind more than 71 percent of recent attacks in the province as a “self-created narrative.” “People know the truth; you cannot fool everyone all the time. This attempt should stop. People understand why terrorism exists.”
Raja pointed to a jirga convened a month earlier in the provincial assembly, attended by representatives from every district and political faction, where participants spoke openly about the roots of unrest and bloodshed. “You cannot hide behind your own rigid statements.”
In a lengthy post on X, Chief Minister Afridi defended Khan as “Pakistan’s most popular and widely trusted leader” and the party as the country’s largest, arguing that the spokesman’s “politically motivated statements that run contrary to facts” damaged the dignity of state institutions and mocked constitutional values.
He said opposition to any new military operation extended beyond his party to all political and religious groups in the province, who viewed it as an unsustainable fix. “The issue is not merely whether the state is serious about combating terrorism; the issue is also that decisions are being made without taking into confidence the ground realities, elected representatives, the local population, and the provincial government,” Afridi wrote.
He mentioned persistent insecurity in several districts, where residents faced economic stagnation, displacement fears and exclusion from policy decisions, disrupting business, education and daily life. Noting that 22 major operations and about 14,000 intelligence-based ones had failed to eradicate terrorism, he questioned flaws in policy and execution. “At such a juncture, instead of insisting on ineffective policies devised behind closed doors, a clear policy shift has become unavoidable,” Afridi said. “National resources are being squandered on these failed strategies, while the lives and property of the people remain under constant threat.”
Afridi demanded guarantees that another operation would yield lasting peace, given past failures despite heavy losses. “Without transparency in policymaking, clear objectives, and measurable results, any new initiative risks creating further uncertainty rather than peace.”
He called it “deeply regrettable and painful” to link a province that had lost nearly 80,000 lives in the anti-terrorism fight to the militants themselves, warning that such views from a state representative could undermine national unity and stability. “In such a situation, irresponsible and unsubstantiated allegations by the director general of a state institution not only fuel hatred against Pakistan’s most popular political party but also create the impression that abandoning a political force to the mercy of terrorists has become part of policy—reflecting a dangerous and deeply regrettable mindset.”
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