Pakistan Army accused of ‘targeting’ Arshad Sharif

Nairobi [Kenya], October 28 (ANI): The Pakistani army has been accused of ‘targeting’ journalist Arshad Sharif and his alleged assassination in Kenya.
Unable to reject the charge outright as it generally does, the army is on the back foot, having to endorse a “high-level investigation” into the “accidental” killing of Arshad Sharif by the ‘Kenyan Police’, reported Africa Daily Digital.
The Pakistani state’s critics, among them scribes, political workers and human rights activists, have been found dead under mysterious circumstances in France, Sweden and Canada. One known attempt in Britain failed but became the cause of a police probe and court trial.
While the main opposition and former prime minister Imran Khan have led the charge, the government has announced a judicial probe, reported Africa Daily Digital.
Analysts say this is another instance of eliminating an inconvenient operative abroad. The Kenyan Police’s involvement – the army is accused of working through its ‘agents’ in that force that has been called ‘corrupt’ and ‘notorious’ in media reports, complicates the matter.
Arshad Sharif, son of a former Pakistan Navy chief, was specialised in investigative journalism and covered many political events in the country for national and international news organisations.
He was awarded the Pride of Performance by the President of Pakistan Arif Alvi for his contributions to journalism. President of Pakistan Arif Alvi described Sharif’s death as “a great loss to journalism and Pakistan, reported Africa Daily Digital.
Afzal Butt, president of the Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists (PFUJ), expressed his grief at the news and called for an inquiry into the killing of Sharif.
Journalist Kamran Khan questioned the government on Twitter and asked the Prime Minister to take “the nation in confidence”.
Arshad Sharif’s case is different in that for the first time, the charge is direct, and comes amidst political and economic turmoil. The army itself, about to have a new Chief next month, is a key part of the political shenanigans, reported Africa Daily Digital.
The analysts at home and outside view the army as part of the problem, not the solution. Even those who grimly foresee a likely military intervention, point to its failure in the past.
The army is actually under attack from within, the polity that it has deeply influenced and overridden for close to seven decades. Worse — it is an attack from the very people it has nurtured and played one against another, reported Africa Daily Digital.
The most glaring example is Shireen Mazari, a scribe turned security analyst who was close to the military, even when she joined politics and was till April this year, the Minister for Human Rights in the Imran Khan Government.
In her social media post, she claimed to have met Arshad Sharif. She has stopped short of directly naming the army for Arshad’s alleged murder, but has left little to the imagination by accusing “those who cannot win a war.”
The oblique reference is to four wars that the Pakistan Army initiated against India but failed to achieve its stated tactical and strategic objectives, the most obvious being the seizure of Jammu and Kashmir from India. In Pakistan, this charge is fatal, reported Africa Daily Digital.
Complicating the army’s woes is the direct attack from Imran Khan who said that he had known the scribe, calling him a ‘martyr’. He had urged him to ‘desist’, and flee the country, but did not explain what ‘desist’ from doing.
Khan is confronting the army that propped up Khan through the years, to win the 2018 elections, against political ‘dynasties’, the Bhutto-Zardaris of the PPP and the Sharifs who head the PML-N. Khan accuses the army of helping both families to share power after he was voted out in a parliamentary coup in April, reported Africa Daily Digital.
Khan now wants a snap poll, but the military under Army Chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa, is backing the incumbent regime’s agenda of setting the economy right before holding an uncertain election. (ANI)