Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf Chairman Imran Khan said on Tuesday that he was ready to hold talks with the Haqqani group if the government allowed him to do so.
Speaking to media persons after meeting with dengue patients at the Services Hospital, Imran said it was an anomaly that the US was negotiating with the Taliban but ordered Pakistan to target them. He claimed that he could influence the Haqqanis for peace and stability in the region. Imran insisted on using the Haqqanis to ensure a peace pact with Taliban and withdrawal of the US troops from Afghanistan.
The PTI chief said the time had come to find a political solution of the problem because the US was already engaged in dialogue for an end to the war in Afghanistan. He said the government would have to pull out the forces from the tribal areas in order to deal with the existing problems successfully, as they had been deployed to please the US. Imran was of the opinion that any escalation in North Waziristan was tantamount to committing a suicide.
To a question about attending the All parties Conference (APC) convened by Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani, the PTI chief said he would attend the moot; however, all the political parties must have to agree to the point that terrorism could only be eliminated through negotiations and not through military operation.
