ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf Chairman Imran Khan said on Saturday that the Billion Tree Tsunami project has been completed in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and 1.12 billion trees were planted during the forestry drive.

The PTI chairman was speaking to journalists, where he briefed them on the tree plantation project.

He said the trees were planted over a period of three years, however, the PTI chief lamented that propaganda is being used to defame the forestry project.

The project has been under scrutiny because of the magnitude of the project. Recently, the official documents of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government failed to correspond with the claims made by the PTI chief regarding the project.

It is pertinent to mention that in August, an investigation within the government departments revealed that 145 officers of the KP forest division were found involved in corruption.

Legal action was taken against those 145 officers, whereas, 44 officials were forcefully retired due to misappropriation of funds and other reasons regarding the project.

Billion Tree Tsunami aims to turn around deforestation and increase the province?s forested area by at least two per cent.

About 40 per cent of the country?s remaining forests are in KP province.

Imran Khan and PTI-backed tree planting effort was said to hit its billion-tree goal by the end of 2017.