ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf leader Shah Mehmood Qureshi on Tuesday slammed the former premier Nawaz Sharif over his recent statement on 2008 Mumbai attacks.
While addressing a session at the National Assembly, Qureshi said, “Nawaz is not leaving any opportunity to bring Pakistan a bad name.”
“Nawaz’s statement will take us from the greylist to the black-list,” he further commented while referring to Pakistan’s inclusion into the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) grey-list.
“Instead of asking what is wrong with his statement, Nawaz Sharif should explain what was the need of saying what he said,” Qureshi continued regarding the former premier’s interview to Dawn newspaper published on May 12.
The PTI leader further said, “Indian media exploited Nawaz’s statement and it reached a point where a meeting of the National Security Council had to be called.”
“Nawaz Sharif has rejected Monday’s statement of the NSC which had condemned his controversial remarks and the entire nation is in a state of chaos since,” he added.
“For the past two days, Nawaz’s controversial statement is the topic of debate,” the PTI leader said.
Earlier, Nawaz Sharif’s recent interview to local media has stirred a controversy and has drawn ire of the country’s top civil and military leadership with the National Security Committee (NSC) categorically denying the statement, calling it “completely false and misleading”.
The former premier had said: “Militant organisations are active. Call them non-state actors, should we allow them to cross the border and kill 150 people in Mumbai? Explain it to me. Why can’t we complete the trial?”
Nawaz’s remarks were immediately picked up by the Indian media, which termed the former prime minister’s statement as a “confession of Pakistan’s role in the Mumbai attacks that left 166 people dead”.
