Rift between Pak PM Sharif, interior minister ?

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has developed differences with his powerful interior minister Nisar Ali Khan over issues including the military's spat with Jang media group and talks with the Taliban, media reported on Friday.

The Dawn reported that Khan has stopped giving his weekly press briefing and also has vanished from TV screens.

Khan was not even seen on channels on the night of Karachi airport attack. He has also stopped accompanying Sharif when he attends parliament session and also been missing the parliamentary activities.

He even did not turn up on the day the budget was presented in the National Assembly.

"Since then, the prime minister came to the house twice but Mr Khan was missing each time; earlier, he was always there, by Nawaz Sharif's side as the latter walked in," the paper reported.

One of the two PML-N leaders, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, explained how Sharif's cagey way of working had put off many of the party's key leaders including Khan.

The discontentment has worsened with the budget session as the senior leadership had not been provided any information beforehand of the budget.

Khan and many others within the party are not happy that finance minister Ishaq Dar, a relative of Sharif, had not sought their suggestions or shared any information with them about the 2014-15 budget.

A second party leader asserts that the interior minister was also not happy with the prime minister's handling of the tussle between Geo TV and the military establishment due the channel blaming the ISI for an attack on its anchor Hamid Mir in April.

Khan went so far as to say that the issue was allowed to linger on, making the government look indecisive. These concerns had been voiced in front of a few party members.

There are reports that Khan was not happy the way talks with Taliban were announced, as Sharif had agreed to launch military operation against the Taliban in January but made last minute changes in the speech and appointed a four-member committee for talks.

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