ISLAMABAD, Oct 14: The Alliance for the Restoration of Democracy (ARD) is facing crisis owing to differences on some issues between People’s Party Parliamentarians and Pakistan Muslim League-N, the two major components of the alliance, sources said.

The sources said that the main issues included the formation of a grand opposition alliance and resignations from parliament.

PML-N chairman Raja Zafarul Haq on Thursday had publicly spoken about the ‘differences’ between the two parties and said that the October 19 meeting between the two former prime ministers, Nawaz Sharif and Benazir Bhutto, could be the last one if differences were not resolved.

A senior PML-N leader, on condition of anonymity, said though the PPP had been denying that it was in contact with the Musharraf regime, the acts and attitude of its leaders were not matching their claims.

The PML-N leader claimed that soon after the killing of Jamhoori Watan Party chief Nawab Akbar Bugti during a military operation in Balochistan the PML-N had decided to quit assemblies and Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal chief Qazi Hussain Ahmed had agreed to convince his alliance’s leadership for submitting resignations, but the PPP leadership said that it was not a proper time.

He said that his party had complete trust in the PPP before the statement of Ms Bhutto in which she admitted to have some contacts with the regime and then the statement of Makhdoom Amin Fahim that there was no need of a grand alliance.

Such statements were giving the message to the nation that the opposition was not united, he said, adding that his party could not understand why the PPP was against the formation of a grand opposition alliance.

It was difficult to join hands with the MMA, a PPP leader said, adding that the religious alliance’s leaders tried to impose their own ideology on each and every issue.

PPP information secretary Sherry Rehman termed the reports of the PPP striking some deal with the regime as based on “speculations”.