At a time when political circles are abuzz with claims that Former Pakistan president Asif Ali Zardari may be entering into an understanding with the country’s military high command, the former Pak president has claimed that ousted prime minister Nawaz Sharif and his brother Shehbaz Sharif had twice planned to assassinate him, reports stated.

According to the Hindustan Times, Zardari, 62, told party workers in Lahore’s Bilawal House on Saturday that the Sharif brothers had plotted his murder while he was serving an eight-year sentence in connection with corruption cases filed against him. “The Sharif brothers twice planned my murder in captivity in 1990s,” Zardari was quoted as saying.

He said the plan was to kill him while he was going to attend his court hearing. In another incident, the Sharif brothers ordered jailers to cut out his tongue, Zardari claimed, adding that he would not honour an agreement signed between his deceased wife Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz, called the “charter of democracy”. “I have not yet forgotten what they (the Sharifs) have done to Benazir Bhutto and me. We forgave them. They cannot be trusted this time around and I will not shake hands with them,” he was quoted as saying.

Under the charter, both parties were supposed to support each other when under threat from non-democratic forces.

Zardari’s claims come a month after former dictator General Pervez Musharraf accused him of being involved in Bhutto’s assassination.