Pakistan: ISI Says Imran Khan Asked Army Chief To Do 'Illegal, Unconstitutional' Acts

In an unprecedented press conference, Pakistan military and spy agency Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) on Thursday went all out against former Prime Minister Imran Khan and said that he had asked Army Chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa to do "illegal and unconstitutional" acts.

ISI chief Lieutenant General Nadeem Ahmed Anjum further said that Bajwa was given a "lucrative offer" in March by Khan's government amidst the political turmoil at the time. 

The Pakistani military brass's comments come as Khan ups the ante against organs of Pakistani state. Since before his ouster, Khan has been alleging a conspiracy against him, which he claims includes the country's then-Opposition and the military. Following his ouster in April in a no-confidence vote, Khan has claimed the Shehbaz Sharif-led government as "foreign" and "imported" and has attacked state organs for conspiring against him.

"(Khan's criticism) is because the military and its chief refused to do illegal or unconstitutional things," Anjum said, as per Reuters, and added that the military had made a policy decision to stay out of politics, and hence turned down Khan's persistent requests.

Pakistani military and ISI are believed to be the most powerful institutions in Pakistan. Earlier, Pakistan was under military rule for decades with army chiefs serving as presidents. Democracy is still an ongoing project in Pakistan and no Prime Minister has so far completed their five-year tenure. Even during civilian governments, it's believed that the national security and foreign policies are set by the all-powerful military. Khan is the most vocal critic of the military-intelligence alliance in the longest time, despite reports saying he was propped as prime minister by the military itself.

Reuters reported that speaking alongside Anjum, military spokesman Lieutenant-General Babar Iftikhar said the extraordinary step of getting the spy chief to speak in public was taken because of a smear campaign against the military.

Anjum in the conference said the military-ISI have moved past their political days.

"It [the lucrative offer] was made in front of me. He [Bajwa] rejected it because he wanted the institution to move forward from a controversial role to a constitutional role," said Anjum.

Bajwa is set to retire as army chief next month. He is currently on a three-year extension as service chief.

Continuing the thinly-veiled attack on Khan, Anjum added that the army chief was called a traitor and his family was also targeted.

He said, "If you see him as a traitor, then why do you meet him through the back door? You meet quietly at night through the back door and express your unconstitutional wishes but call [the army chief] a traitor in broad daylight. That's a big contradiction between your words and your actions."

The Print further reported that the ISI said that Khan was seeking to foment "anarchy in the country".

Though out of power, Khan remains widely popular in Pakistan and has held huge rallies since his ouster in which he has repeated his claims. Since prior his ouster, Khan had claimed that the United States was behind his ouster. He said that the foreign force was unhappy with his pursuit of independent foreign policy. Citing a letter written to Pakistan Foreign Office by a Pakistani mission abroad, Khan said that the concerned mission was told by the host country that relations with Pakistan would suffer if Khan remained in power.

Outlook earlier reported that Khan is taking on the Pakistani military publicly and observers wonder whether Pakistani military has for real withdrawn from politics or whether their clout is down. 

Outlook's Seema Guha noted, "These questions are being asked primarily because Imran Khan is taking on General Qamar Javed Bajwa and his top aides publicly. He is blaming them for siding with his rivals...But going by what is happening on the ground, something is afoot. But are observers making too much of it and the current situation is the usual jockeying for power among powerful generals all eyeing the top post?"

Former Indian High Commissioner to Islamabad TCA Raghavan told Outlook, "There are some in Pakistan who have been positing that the political feuding in Pakistan is only the expression of divisions within the Army and that one section supports Imran Khan for he would not have gone to the lengths he did without some support of this kind. There is no evidence for this theory and possibly will not be for some time but it does have a certain currency.

"In my view, there may be some sympathy for Imran Khan in the military — not in any conspiratorial sense but in the same way as there is in the rest of the country. But it is likely that his political agenda is of his own making. The military's control over politicians is never absolute and it is true that it has been reducing progressively over the years."

Political commentator Gul Bukhari told The Print, "The Pakistan Army had been panicked by Imran’s attacks, but seemed reluctant to act because of their internal divisions. Finally, the Generals seem confident enough of their authority to crack the whip."

(With PTI inputs)