Imran asks Pak President to draw up clear operational lines for ISPR

Islamabad, Nov 7 (IANS) Former Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan has called on President Arif Alvi to define “clear operational lines” of the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) while also asking him to act against the “abuse of power and violations of our laws and of the Constitution”, it emerged on Monday, according to a media report.

In a letter dated November 6, the PTI chief appealed to the President to take note of “serious wrongdoings” which are undermining the country’s national security. He also asked Alvi to identify the “guilty” and hold them accountable, Dawn reported.

He claimed that the Official Secrets Act was breached when a “confidential conversation between myself as Prime Minister, the Chief of Army Staff and the Director General of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), on a supposedly secure line, was ‘leaked’ to the media”, the report said.

“This raises a very serious question as to who or what organisation was involved in doing a clearly illegal wiretap of the PM’s secure phone line? This is a breach of national security at the highest level,” he said.

A series of separate audio recordings surfaced in September, allegedly featuring the leadership of the PTI and PML-N holding informal conversations never meant to be heard by the public.

Khan also posed two further questions: How the head of Pakistan’s premier intelligence agency could hold a public press conference and how two military bureaucrats could hold a “highly political press conference”, Dawn reported.

“The parameters of a military information organisation such as the ISPR also need to be clearly defined and limited to information relating to defence and military issues. As supreme commander of the armed forces, I call on you to initiate the drawing up of these clear operational lines for the ISPR.”

–IANS

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