The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) has reacted strongly to Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) supremo Nawaz Sharif’s return to the country, saying the “coward fugitive is returning under judicial asylum”, a private TV channel reported. In a statement on Saturday, a PTI spokesperson said “state has buried shame, modesty, law and justice with its own hands” to pave the way for “national criminal’s return” to the country from London. The three-time former prime minister has returned to Pakistan after ending a 4-year self-imposed exile in London and is hoping to make a political comeback in the upcoming general elections expected to be held in the last week of January next year. His smooth return to the country was ensured after he secured relief from the Islamabad High Court and an accountability court, averting the threat of immediate arrest upon landing. Nawaz has been prime minister three times, but was ousted in 2017 and given a lifetime disqualification from politics after being convicted for not declaring a receivable salary. Referring to the ouster of the Imran Khan-led government in April 2022, the PTI spokesperson said after the regime change conspiracy, the state elements after ridiculing the Constitution and democracy “tied the country and the nation in the chains of dictatorship and thrown it to the corrupt wolves”. The statement further said that incarcerated PTI chairman Imran Khan launched a political struggle against the nexus between the criminals and the state 27 years ago. It said that the nation is standing against thieves, mafia and plunderers under the leadership of Khan. “The nation is ready to ‘welcome’ its criminal who has been ‘adopted’ by the state,” the PTI spokesperson said adding that the people will hold accountable the criminals who have robbed the nation from generation to generation. The statement also reiterated the demand that an immediate holding of transparent, free and fair elections can steer the country out of crisis.