New York: Pakistan named a career infantry officer considered a moderate as army chief on Wednesday as the country fights a Taliban insurgency and seeks accord with the United States on how to stabilize neighboring Afghanistan.
According to famous US newspaper New York Time, new Chief of Army Staff (COAS), Lieutenant General Raheel Sharif considers the militant threat inside Pakistan as important as the strategic tussle with India, a retired senior army officer who Sharif has served under told the newspaper.
“Sharif has played a big role in convincing the army that the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and assorted militants inside Pakistan are as big a threat (as India),” the officer said.
The newspaper said that the the announcement comes as tension with arch-rival India over disputed Kashmir is rising and as the United States seeks Pakistan’s help in bringing peace to Afghanistan ahead of the withdrawal of most Western forces there next year.
“The army chief is arguably the most powerful person in Pakistan, with the military having ruled the country for more than half its 66-year history since independence from Britain”, the report added.
Nawaz Sharif has declared he wanted to disentangle the military from politics but the military is unlikely to relinquish its hold at such a sensitive time.
“Nawaz should know that whether it is Raheel Sharif or someone else as army chief, he won’t do the PM’s bidding – he will be driven by the institution first and last,” security analyst Hasan Askari Rizvi told the newspaper.
Sharif, 57, received his military commission in 1976 and studied military leadership in Germany, Canada and Britain. He commanded several infantry units, including the Sixth Frontier Force Regiment along the disputed Line Of Control in Kashmir.
Perhaps his most important contribution has been his role in the reshaping the country’s strategic policy.
In 2007, the military undertook an ambitious program of re-thinking its strategic doctrine, following the appointment of Kayani as army chief.
His brother, Major Shabbir Sharif, received two of the country’s highest military awards for his action during the 1971 India-Pakistan war in which he was killed.
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