A day after an hour-long meeting with Chief of Army Staff General Qamar Javed Bajwa, Chairman Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Imran Khan Saturday declined to divulge details of his meeting but he did say that the General "stands by democracy." Speaking at an event about PTI''s Billion Tree Tsunami project here, Imran said, "The only thing I would like to say about the meeting is that the army chief stands by democracy and this is good news."
The social media was abuzz with speculations after Major General Asif Ghafoor, Director General Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), the army''s media wing, tweeted about the meeting which stated, "PTI chairman called on COAS [and] facilitated him on his prom [promotion] and appointment (as Army Chief)...various issues came under discussion."
Many Twitter users interpreted the news of the meeting as having a greater meaning while the country awaits the Supreme Court''s verdict in the high-profile Panama Papers case embroiling the family of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. However, the ISPR provided no further details, while PTI''s media cell said the hour-long meeting focused on national integrity and security and discussions were also held on conditions prevailing in the region.
The Army Chief and the PTI chairman also discussed repatriation of Afghan refugees and the recent wave of terror attacks, added the statement issued by the PTI''s central media secretariat. Though the event was held to discuss his party''s climate change initiative, Khan was promptly asked a question about his meeting with the Army Chief. He responded with a broad smile, "If I respond to this in detail, the headlines will be dominated by this and no one will talk about climate change."
"I''m glad that Khyber Pukhtunkhwa government has taken up this momentous task of dealing with climate change and has taken a hands-on approach towards it," Khan said while discussing the measures the KP government is taking to protect its forests against the attacks of timber mafia.
Discussing the Billion Tree Tsunami project he said, "I know it is hard to trust our statistics after the federal government continuously tells lies to you, but I can assure you the project will end by the end of 2017 and one billion trees will have been planted by that time."
Discussing the impact of climate change, the PTI chairman stated that Pakistan has remained oblivious to this threat for a long time and the project, in the long run will have a positive impact on the generations to come. The Billion Tree Tsunami involves planting trees both by planting and natural regeneration all over the KP. It aims to turn around deforestation and increase the provincial forested area by at least 2 per cent.
Tree felling has reduced Pakistan''s forests to under 2 per cent of its land area, one of the lowest levels in the region, according to a 2015 UN Food and Agriculture Organisation report. About 40 per cent of the country''s remaining forests are in KP and in preparation for the reforestation effort, the provincial government helped set up a network of tree nurseries across the province in 2016, providing loans and purchase agreements for tree saplings.
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