Sharif sacks top aide over info leak, army ‘rejects’ it

Islamabad, April 29

Beleaguered Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif today faced a crisis when Pakistan’s powerful army rejected his move to sack top aide Tariq Fatemi and demanded full implementation of recommendations by a committee which probed a story on a rift between the army and the government.

The Sharif government was quick to go into a damage-control mode after the confrontation with the army over a “notification” and announced that the “real notification” to implement the recommendation of the probe was yet to be issued.

In October, a columnist for Dawn newspaper wrote about a rift between civilian and military leaderships over militant groups that operate from Pakistan but engage in a proxy war against India and Afghanistan.

Dawn had reported how in a “blunt and unprecedented warning”, the civilian government had informed the military leadership of growing international isolation of Pakistan on terrorism.

The army took strong exception and the PML-N government was forced to remove then information minister Pervaiz Rasheed, but a probe was also initiated at the army’s behest to fix responsibility. According to the report, special foreign affairs assistant Fatemi was primarily responsible for leaking the report of the meeting.

Today, in an unusual move, the army rejected the “notification” by the government to sack Fatemi. “Notification on ‘Dawn’ leak is incomplete and not in line with recommendations by the Inquiry Board. Notification is rejected,” army spokesman Maj Gen Asif Ghafoor tweeted.

Minutes later, Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan in a veiled criticism of the hasty reaction said, “Twitter reactions were highly dangerous for the country.”

“There are several issues of great importance and it’s unfortunate they are being dealt with through tweets. State institutions don’t communicate with each other through tweets,” Khan said. — Agencies