Former Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan has hit out at the country's former Army chief General (retired) Qamar Javed Bajwa for being involved in a conspiracy that led to the fall of his Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government in April this year.
"My question today is, who was responsible for this regime change? Gen Bajwa is the only person responsible for bringing down the PTI government," he said in a video address to party workers on Saturday.
"General Bajwa was the army chief at that time; that's why I didn't talk about him before. Instead of admitting his mistake, General Bajwa started oppressing us," Khan added.
The PTI chief further claimed that though General Bajwa tried to conceal his intentions, he still got to know about his plan to oust him from power.
"I was fully aware of the conspiracy. I had realized a year ago that Shehbaz Sharif was being prepared to replace me," Khan noted.
This is not the first time the politician has blamed Bajwa for having a role in his removal from the South Asian nation's top post.
Earlier this year, he claimed that the “conspiracy” to topple the Imran Khan government through a no-confidence vote was “hatched” by Nawaz Sharif, the country's ex-prime minister in collusion with then-Army chief Bajwa and US President Joe Biden's administration.
But General Bajwa, who retired last month after leading Pakistan's military for more than six years, denied Khan's charges that his office played a role in his removal as PM.
"You think that the armed forces would sit idly by if there were an external conspiracy in the country," Bajwa said, referring to Khan's accusations that the vote of confidence against him was plotted by the United States. "A state of hysteria was created in the country on the pretext of a fake and false narrative."