ISLAMABAD: The government and the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) will formally resume on Friday (today) their dialogue aimed at resolving the issue of alleged rigging in last year’s general elections.

According to PTI’s Information Secretary Dr Shireen Mazari, the two sides decided to resume the negotiations after head of the government’s negotiating team Finance Minister Ishaq Dar talked to PTI’s Vice-Chairman Shah Mehmood Qureshi.

She said the meeting between committees of the two sides would be held at the residence of PTI’s Secretary General Jahangir Tareen at 4pm.

Mr Dar contacted the PTI’s leadership to give a positive response over the decision by Imran Khan to end his party’s over four-month-long sit-in in Islamabad in solidarity with victims of the terrorist attack on an army-run school in Peshawar.

Mr Khan announced the decision to call off the sit-in while speaking from atop his container at D-Chowk on Wednesday evening after attending a multi-party conference (MPC) chaired by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in Peshawar.

Speaking to media personnel at the end of the MPC, the prime minister had thanked Mr Khan for attending the conference and had assured him that the government would remove the PTI’s concerns regarding alleged rigging in the general elections to his satisfaction.

The talks were earlier scheduled for Tuesday, but were cancelled due to the terrorist attack. Later, the PTI not only withdrew its call for countrywide protests and shutter down, but also ended its sit-in in Islamabad.

Meanwhile, the PTI chairman through a message on Twitter said his party would revisit the decision to go back to the National Assembly only after formation of a judicial commission to investigate the allegations of rigging in the elections.

Published in Dawn, December 19th, 2014