Islamabad: The Pakistan Army on Monday expressed displeasure over Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan’s recent ‘anti-military’ statements and said it was “aghast” over it.

Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), in a statement said that the army was “aghast” at the defamatory and uncalled-for statements about the senior leadership of the military by the PTI chairman during a Faisalabad rally.

The military’s media wing said that regrettably, an attempt was made to discredit and undermine the senior leadership of the army at a time when the institution was laying lives for the “security and safety of the people every day”.

The army said that senior politicians trying to stir controversies over the appointment of the COAS, the procedure for which is well-defined in the Constitution, is “most unfortunate and disappointing”, reports Geo News.

“Senior leadership of the army has decades-long impeccable meritorious service to prove its patriotic and professional credentials beyond any doubt,” the ISPR said, adding that politicising the senior leadership of the institution and scandalising the process of COAS’s selection is neither in the interest of the state of Pakistan nor of the institution.

“Pakistan Army reiterates its commitment to uphold the constitution of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan,” the military’s media wing said.

In a public rally in Faisalabad, the PTI chairman called out the government, saying that it was delaying the elections to appoint an army chief of its own and that if a “patriotic chief of army staff comes in, he will not spare the incumbent rulers.”