Army to toe Parliament’s line

ISLAMABAD - Calling for national consensus on crucial security matters, Pakistan Army Tuesday said it is the responsibility of political leadership to take ‘vital’ decisions and the establishment would comply with it.
During an in-camera briefing at General Headquarters (GHQ) given by Army’s top brass to the members of National Assembly’s Standing Committee on Defence and Senate’s Standing Committee on Defence and Defence Production, Army Chief General Kayani said it was the duty of Pakistan’s political leadership to develop consensus on drone attacks and adopt a line of action. “Military would follow that line.”
The Army Chief was quoted as saying that it was the incumbent government’s responsibility to implement the decisions taken in APC on Pak-US relationship.
A parliamentarian from the PML-N reportedly took up the US troops’ deployment in Afghanistan’s Khost city that borders NWA and questioned Pakistan military’s silence over the issue.
General Kayani reportedly responded as saying that military operations and troops deployment in Afghan side was a routine practice and it did not concern Pakistan. “Our job is to secure our side. It is not in our knowledge if any significant military activity has taken place at the border area in Afghanistan,” Kayani is reported to have expressed ignorance over the issue. He said the decision to launch any military operation in Pakistan rested with the country’s government.
Most part of the ISI DG’s briefing is reported to have consisted of the Pak-US relationship while the DG MO mostly talked about terrorism in Pakistani areas from Afghanistan. Lieutenant General Pasha mentioned Pakistan Army’s refusal to launch NWA operation saying that Pakistan would continue strategic relationship with the US considering its national interests. Pasha was reportedly asked about the US and Afghanistan’s joint preparations against Haqqani Network. In response, he purportedly said that Pakistan Army had repeatedly asked the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) to act against Afghan militants. “We asked them to go against people like Fazlullah but they have failed to respond. If they proceed against militants in Afghanistan, that’s their decision. We are not involved in Afghanistan but we expect them to eliminate militants just like they expect us to,” he said.
Major General Iqbal claimed that the operations in Chitral and Upper Dir against Afghan militants were successful and those areas were effectively guarded against militants. He said that military had handed over control to civilian security forces in most parts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and it was their job to establish civilian government’s writ.
Contrary to the media speculations that Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) leaders were not part of the GHQ briefing, a senior PML-N leader confirmed N-League’s participation in the briefing.
Talking to TheNation, PML-N leader Raja Zafar-ul-Haq said that he as well as his party colleagues who were members of the aforementioned parliamentary committees attended the briefing. “The reports aired by some television channels that PML-N boycotted the briefing are just absurd and baseless. We were very much part of the Tuesday briefing.” Refusing to share any details of the GHQ briefing, Haq said, “The briefing was in-camera so I cannot disclose details but I can tell that the meeting continued for around three hours, we asked questions and the Army Chief and his men addressed our queries in detail.”
Asked if he and his party were satisfied with the military’s briefing, the PML-N leader said, “Well, I can’t respond to it. A briefing was held in GHQ, we participated in it and that’s all I can say.”
Some days ago, the Parliamentary Committee on National Security had decided with voice vote not to attend any briefing in GHQ citing the committee’s ‘superiority’, as an organ of the parliament, over GHQ. “They (GHQ) better come to us if they want to brief,” RazaRabbani, the committee’s chairman, had said.

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