Pakistan
Prime Minister Shehbaz chairing NSC meeting on audio leaks
Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif will head the meeting of the National Security Committee (NSC), scheduled to take place this afternoon (Wednesday), as multiple audio leaks linked to the top government officials surface.
Sources privy to the matter said that Minister of Defence Khawaja Asif, Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari, Interior Minister Rana Sanaullah and federal minister for finance will attend the 39th meeting of the NSC. Moreover, tri-services chiefs and heads of the sensitive agencies will also be present on the occasion.
Sources said that the agencies heads will brief the meeting about secret audio recordings matter. The other affairs to be discussed at the meeting include a review of the security of prime minister’s office and the economic and flood situation in Pakistan.
PM Shehbaz says ‘audio leaks’ put Pakistan’s prestige at stake
PM Shehbaz Sharif on Tuesday said that the “audio leaks” had marred the country’s standing in the international community as no one would feel free to speak with the prime minister out of privacy concerns.
He said this while addressing a press conference at the Prime Minister’s House in the federal capital.
The younger Sharif said the “audio leaks” scandal was a critical matter and he was in the process of forming a high-level committee to probe into it.
“Who is going tovisit the Pakistani prime minister from overseas now?” the PM questioned. “This scandal has put the prestige of a 220 million-strong nation at stake.”
Audio leaks
The latest and second leaked audio that had gone viral on social media — allegedly featuring PM Shehbaz, Rana Sanaullah, Defence Minister Khawaja Muhammad Asif, Sardar Ayaz Sadiq and others — contained a discussion regarding PTI’s resignations.
In it, PML-N leaders can be allegedly heard expressing their opinions over PTI’s resignations. They are also talking about London’s permission to accept the resignations.
Before that, another leaked audio had gone viral on social media — allegedly featuring PM Shehbaz — that contained a discussion regarding PML-N Vice President Maryam Nawaz asking for a power plant from India to be imported for her son-in-law.
