Second Round of Government-PTI Talks Ends Without a Deal, Hours Before the October 4 March

A second round of talks between the federal government and PTI broke up on Saturday evening without an agreement, leaving Pakistan's capital bracing for a march its own organisers were, for the first time, debating whether to delay.

A late start, and the same two sticking points

The session convened in National Assembly Speaker Ayaz Sadiq's chamber — the same venue as Friday's first round — but started nearly three hours behind schedule, around 4:45pm, as both delegations waited on final instructions from their leaderships. Once underway, the talks circled the same two demands that stalled Friday's session: PTI wants founder Imran Khan moved from Adiala Jail to a hospital for treatment, his sisters released from the detention they've been held in since their arrest ahead of the march, and early hearings scheduled in his pending cases. The government's position has not moved either — it wants the October 4 march called off entirely, not rescheduled or rerouted, before it will discuss any of PTI's conditions.

Friday's round had already turned tense, with PM's adviser Rana Sanaullah and Senate Opposition Leader Allama Raja Nasir Abbas clashing over whether courts' verdicts on the long march were being implemented, forcing Ayaz Sadiq to intervene and ask both men to show restraint. That friction carried into Saturday's session without either side conceding ground on the substance.

PTI's committees start talking about a delay, not a cancellation

The more significant development happened away from the negotiating table. PTI's political and core committees met separately on Saturday to take stock of where the talks stood, with party chairman Barrister Gohar Ali Khan briefing members on both rounds. A majority of those who spoke argued for continuing the dialogue rather than walking away from it. Several participants went further, floating the idea that the march's date itself could be pushed back if the talks kept making headway — a notably different posture from the one PTI held after Friday's round, when its negotiators said publicly that the march would proceed "regardless" of how talks went.

Nothing was decided. No announcement followed either session confirming a new date, a cancellation, or a breakthrough on Khan's detention conditions. What's changed is that delay is now on the table inside PTI's own leadership discussions in a way it demonstrably wasn't 24 hours earlier.

What's still unresolved going into Sunday

The federal government's threat to invoke emergency rule in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa remains unwithdrawn, and KP Chief Minister Sohail Afridi has given no public sign he's backing away from the march his province's party is organising. More than a thousand shipping containers and a large security deployment remain in place around Islamabad, left over from the march's earlier, postponed date and the roughly Rs1 billion security bill that came with it.

What two rounds of talks have established is that both sides are now negotiating face to face rather than through statements to reporters, and that PTI's internal conversation has shifted from "march regardless" toward "march, unless talks keep moving." Whether that shift produces an actual postponement — or simply a march that goes ahead anyway with both sides having already shown their hand — should be clear within hours, not days.

Build Better Pakistan's Politics Desk covers Khyber Pakhtunkhwa's institutions and its relationship with the federal government as part of our ongoing coverage.