Feeding of false news breach of national security: commanders

ISLAMABAD: The corps commanders on Friday expressed serious concern over the feeding of a “false and fabricated” story about an important security meeting held at the PM House and termed it a ‘breach of national security’, the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) said.

The commanders met here at the General Headquarters (GHQ) with Chief of the Army Staff General Raheel Sharif in the chair.The top brass held a comprehensive review of internal and external security situation with particular focus on the prevailing environment at the LoC and operational preparedness of the army.

The meeting was also attended by the Principal Staff Officers.The commanders rejected the absurd Indian claims of hoax surgical strikes terming them an attempt to divert the international community’s attention away from the brutalities being committed by the Indian Army against the innocent Kashmiris.

The commanders resolved that any attempt of misadventure and irresponsible act from the Indian side would get a befitting response from the security forces of Pakistan.Expressing complete satisfaction over the operational preparedness of troops, General Raheel reiterated the Pakistan Army’s resolve to defend every inch of the motherland at any cost against the full spectrum of threat.

Recounting the successes of Operation Zarb-e-Azb achieved so far and the resultant stability being achieved to propel Pakistan into a new phase of development and prosperity, Gen Raheel re-emphasized the need for sustained efforts on internal security to defeat all hostile attempts to reverse the gains made by the security forces.

The participants resolved to continue sustained and focused combing and intelligence-based operations (IBOs) across the length and breadth of the country to uproot terrorism, harmonizing it with implementation of the National Action Plan (NAP) to address extremism and other causes of terrorism.

Meanwhile, as the civil and military officials in New Delhi claim that India had actually conducted a surgical strike inside Pakistan, unavailability of supporting evidence by the government and the military in this regard raises a big question mark on the authenticity of the claim.

Indian journalists also admit that the military had not provided any proof of the surgical strike.In a recent meeting with German ambassador, the Indian foreign secretary reportedly spilled the beans on their claims of surgical strike inside Pakistan terming it a “bluff”.

The Indian media tried to build pressure on Pakistan after the Modi administration boasted of a surgical strike inside Pakistan on September 29 but the information shared by German authorities during a recent meeting with Pakistani officials in Berlin reveals that the Indian Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar himself termed the surgical strike a ‘bluff’.

Pakistani official Ms Rukhsana Afzal had been told by Senior Desk Officer of AfPak Division Ms Simone Stemmler that during a formal meeting on the issue of the ongoing India-Pakistan tension between German Ambassador to India Dr Martin Ney and Indian FS Subramaniam Jaishankar in New Delhi, “the Indian foreign secretary has categorically denied and said there was no ‘surgical strike’ undertaken by the Indian Army inside Azad Kashmir, Pakistan”.

India is also furious at the United Nations and world observer bodies for rejecting its baseless propaganda of a surgical strike in Azad Kashmir.The UN mission monitoring the ceasefire said it “has not directly observed” any firing along the LoC.

Responding to a question on the “surgical strikes” claim of Indian Army, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon’s spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said at a daily press briefing that the UN Military Observer Group in India and Pakistan (UNMOGIP) had not “directly observed” any firing.