Will forward letter to PM if I receive it, says COAS

Chief of the Army Staff (COAS) General Asim Munir has denied receiving any letter from incarcerated PTI founder Imran Khan, stating that he will forward it to Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif even if he receives one. 

“I haven’t received any letter from anyone,” the army chief said. “Even if I do, I won’t read it,” the army chief added in an informal conversation with journalists on Thursday.

The army chief maintained that he would forward any such communication to the prime minister if he received it.

General Munir maintained that the country was progressing satisfactorily and Pakistan was on the path of development.

“Pakistan is moving forward and Pakistan has to move forward,” the army chief added.

The development came only a day after Khan, who has been behind bars since August 2023 in dozens of cases ranging from corruption to terrorism, penned a third open letter to Gen Munir, according to his lawyer.

In the third letter, the jailed PTI founder reiterated election rigging allegations, saying “money launderers" were brought into power via manipulated polls.

"The PTI founder, in his letter to the army chief, has raised the issue of giving preference to the minority over the majority through election fraud," his lawyer Faisal Chaudhry had said in a statement.

Earlier, the 71-year-old cricketer-turned-politician said he had penned two "open letters" to the army chief on Feb 3 and Feb 8, “because all democratic avenues had been obstructed”.

In previous letters, Imran pointed out what he claimed was a growing distance between the military and the public.

In his letters, the former premier penned six points and urged the army to reevaluate its policy to win over the public with reasons and suggestions proposed by Imran to remedy the situation.

The letters held importance as the former ruling party ended its negotiations with the PML-N-led government last month, in which the PTI had demanded two things — the formation of judicial commissions on events that transpired on May 9, 2023, and November 24-27 as well as the release of "all political prisoners", including Khan.

In December last year, Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) Director General Lieutenant General Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry said that no political leader's desire for power should be more important than Pakistan's interests.

The ISPR top spokesperson's comments came in response to a question about purported backdoor talks between the PTI and the establishment.

"All political parties and leaders are respectable to us. No individual, his politics and his desire for power are above Pakistan," he said during a media briefing.

'Letters aim to create rift between army, public'

The government, on the other hand, earlier reacted strongly to Imran's move to write letters to the army chief, with PM's Adviser on Public and Political Affairs Rana Sanaullah saying that they intend to create divisions between the military and the public or sow misunderstandings within the army’s command.

Sanaullah questioned the origin of Khan’s letters from jail, asking: “Where are these letters coming from? If he wants to engage in political struggle, he should do so in the parliament.”

Meanwhile, PML-N Senator Irfan Siddiqui had said that Khan's letter to Gen Asim Munir was proof of the former's "despair and frustration".