The Pakistan Army on Monday warned India not to test the nation’s resolve – two months after a terrorist attack in occupied Kashmir brought the two nuclear-armed neighbours to the brink of war
“India must not test Pakistan’s resolve. It is not 1971 anymore,” said Director General Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) Major General Asif Ghafoor while addressing a press conference.
Referring to the Indian narrative, the military spokesperson said that India has been lying for the past two months and Pakistan has shown responsibility despite these lies and added that the country foiled India’s airstrike but the neighbouring country has continued to lie despite evidence exposing their lies.
Gen Ghafoor reiterated that none of Pakistan Air Force’s (PAF) F-16 fighter aircraft were missing which was also proven by a report in an American news publication.
Moving on to social issues, the army spokesperson stated the target of his press conference is the youth of Pakistan. “We are succeeding in the war, but there remains a lot to be done. Between 1960-1970, Pakistan was in good condition, socially and economically. GDP was over 11 per cent, there was law and order in the country and social indicators were high.”
He also complimented the country’s media and said if the same media was present during the 1971 war, East Pakistan and West Pakistan would not have split up.
“We have inherited the Kashmir issue from our inception. It is linked to our ideology and we will continue to do what we can for their liberation.”
Gen Ghafoor also mentioned the relevance of Pakistan geographically and international proxies in the country.
“In Iran, a revolution came and it impacted our society and seminaries, giving rise to the concept of jihad,” he added.
“Terrorism reached Pakistan after foreign forces entered Afghanistan,” the military spokesperson added.
Reiterating that there is no organised terror entity in Pakistan, DG ISPR stated kinetic operations have been conducted to kill terrorists and dismantle their organisations.
“The state’s will and capacity is also based on financial capability. While we were conducting kinetic operations, we had to deal with threats on our eastern border at least three times.”
“We have intelligence sharing policy with 70 countries. We have incurred economic losses of $300bn to fight the war on terror.”
“Pakistan witnessed a surge in religious seminaries. In 1947 we had 247 madrassas. In 1980, the number went up to 2,861. And now there are over 30,000 madrassas. Out of these, only 100 are involved in propagating terrorism,” said Gen Ghafoor, while elaborating on steps to control and bring seminaries into the mainstream.
“In February, money was allotted to bring the seminaries into the mainstream. Militant organisations carry out militancy 10pc of the time and conduct welfare activities otherwise. To control their welfare activities, the government has made a system to mainstream their social activities.”
The military spokesperson added that to bring the madrassas into the mainstream, they will have to start teaching other subjects so that students have skills other than religious studies.
“All madrassas will be brought under the Ministry of Education so that contemporary subjects can be taught. We will formulate a syllabus which will not have hate speech and the students will be taught respect for different sects.”
“The students will also receive a degree which will be associated with the education board.”
“The mainstreaming has three phases. The first is to prepare a bill which will be ready in around a month. The second phase requires training of teachers and the third phase will be implementation of the bill.”
