Islamabad: The already poor prospects of a peaceful end to the month-old political turmoil in Pakistan’s capital suffered a further setback on Saturday as the two parties holding indefinite sit-ins suspended talks with the government.

Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) and Pakistan Awami Tehreek (PAT), alleging large-scale arrests of their workers, said they would not have any further negotiations until those rounded up were released.

Both parties claim the Pakistan Muslim League-N government got into power through grossly manipulated elections held in 2013.

They are demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and a subsequent independent high-level judicial probe into the alleged rigging.

In separate rounds of talks with the two parties, the government has insisted the resignation demand is unconstitutional and unacceptable, a stance backed by the parliament.

A court in Pakistan ordered on Saturday that 100 opposition activists be sent to jail for holding illegal protests, prompting a tense confrontation between demonstrators and police in the centre of the capital.

Protesters led by former cricket star Imran Khan and Tahirul Qadri, a firebrand cleric, have been locked in a bitter stand-off with the government for weeks.

On Saturday, a crowd of protesters gathered outside a court in Islamabad to protest the decision to send the activists to jail, with some trying to slash the tyres of a police van and shouting “Go, Nawaz, go!”

Although the crowd eventually left peacefully after a two-hour stand-off with police, the episode highlighted just how nervous both sides of the conflict remained after talks to resolve the crisis failed several times.

Jehangir Tareen, a central leader of Imran’s PTI, told a news conference that around 500 party workers were arrested since Friday in the capital and surroundings.

“Thousands of other PTI workers have been taken into custody by the police unlawfully across the Punjab province,” Tareen said, adding that people were picked up from streets and from homes.

A day earlier, Qadri had said around 25,000 workers of his party were behind bars in Punjab.

In Islamabad, PTI workers gathered at the district courts complex in the morning and surrounded some prison vehicles in which their colleagues were to be taken to a jail in the adjacent city of Rawalpindi.

They blocked the way and deflated tyres of at least one of the prison vehicles, while passing on potable water bottles and food to those inside.

Footage on the local private television channels showed a PTI worker who had fainted in a prison van and was being carried away for medical help.

The PTI workers dispersed after arrival of police reinforcements and warnings by Islamabad police chief that those who did not clear the place would be held for obstructing police work.

“The end of the incumbent government’s rule is near,” Qadri told domestic media on Saturday.

The confrontation turned violent last month, with thousands trying to storm Sharif’s house and briefly taking the state television channel off the air.

Violence in the usually quiet capital has alarmed many people in a nation where power has often changed hands though military coups rather than elections.

The army, which has ruled Pakistan for more than half of its history, has stayed out of the conflict, urging both sides to find a political solution.

Yet, some ruling party officials have accused the military itself of instigating the unrest as a way of unsettling Sharif and exerting supremacy over him.

The army has denied it was meddling in civilian affairs, saying it is neutral. Late on Friday, an army spokesman once again repeated that the army had nothing to do with the conflict.

Few commentators think the army wants to seize power again but, even if Sharif survives, he would emerge significantly weakened and likely play second-fiddle to the army on key security and foreign policy issues.

— With inputs from Reuters