This article is more than 6 years old

This article is more than 6 years old

Anti-government demonstrators stormed Pakistan's state broadcaster on Monday in an escalation of a two-week standoff that one party official claimed had been orchestrated by the country's powerful military.

The police, under orders from the civilian government not to use force, were unable to prevent thousands of supporters of former cricket star Imran Khan and populist cleric Tahir-ul-Qadri from entering the offices of the Pakistan Television Corporation (PTV) and a nearby compound of government offices.

"PTV staff performing their journalistic duties are being beaten up," a news anchor said just before the screen went blank.

Many demonstrators, who appeared mostly to be members of Qadri's Pakistan Awami Tehreek (PAT), brandished sticks while some seized weapons from security staff.

But, with all sides in the dispute treating the military with deference, soldiers were able to clear the PTV studios by simply asking the demonstrators to leave.

The scenes, which were broadcast around the country on numerous private stations, embarrassed the PAT and Khan's Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party, which attempted to distance itself from the incident.

Although the two leaders have insisted their protests are peaceful, both have regularly used provocative language likely to incite violence among their supporters.

On Monday protesters also took advantage of an early morning rainstorm which reduced the effectiveness of tear gas fired by police to try to break through barricades of sea containers to reach the prime minister's official residence.

Sharif and his ministers have struggled to deal with the estimated 50,000-strong crowds in the capital city out of fear that any use of force would make the crisis worse.

The army had insisted on restraint on Sunday after clashes on Saturday in which three died and hundreds were injured.

The weekend violence was triggered when Qadri and Khan ordered their followers, who had been camped on a road in a high security area of the capital where government buildings are located, to storm the prime minister's residence, although ultimately they only succeeded in flooding on to the lawns of parliament.

The refusal by security personnel to use force led to surreal scenes with protesters free to simply mill around the large troop deployment in the capital.

The demonstrators first descended on Islamabad on 15 August as part of a campaign to overthrow the government of Nawaz Sharif, the prime minister who won a landslide majority in May 2013.

Many of Khan and Qadri's supporters make no secret of their hope that they would compel the army to either seize power in a coup or force Sharif to step down. Khan, who, like Qadri, has been living on the streets in a modified sea container since August 15, has alluded to a "third umpire" who will send Sharif home, a veiled reference to the army.

Javed Hashmi, a senior member of PTI, added weight to the claims with a somewhat cryptic press conference in which he strongly hinted that Khan was acting at the behest of the army.

Although still nominally the president of the PTI, Hashmi fell out with the party's famous founder over Khan's decision to try to seize the prime minister's house on Saturday.

Although the military has directly ruled Pakistan for half of its history and wields enormous power behind the scenes even when civilians are nominally in control, many analysts doubt the army wants to oust the current government.

Any unconstitutional removal of the government would jeopardise billions of dollars of much-needed US aid.

However it is widely suspected the army will attempt to use the crisis to clip the wings of Sharif who has defied the top brass on a number of issues, including his decision to try former military ruler Pervez Musharraf for high treason.

But television pictures of troops flooding onto the streets highlighted the government's growing vulnerability.

Many of the soldiers were members of the 111 Brigade, which has been responsible during past coups for grabbing government buildings – in particular the offices of PTV.