RAWALPINDI: Chief of the Army Staff General Raheel Sharif has said India is not willing to address historical disputes like Kashmir that have directly fanned misunderstanding and fed into persistent regional culture of conflict.

Gen Raheel stated this while addressing a conference of armed forces chiefs being held in Germany under the auspices of the US Centcom. He highlighted the ongoing atrocities being committed by Indian armed forces in held Kashmir, regional security environment, common challenges and the way forward for the participating countries.

According to a press release issued by the Inter-Services Public Relations here on Monday, besides the host, US Centcom Comman­der Gen Joseph Votel, the army chiefs of Pakistan, Afghanistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyz Republic, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekis­tan are participating in the conference.

They expressed their des­ire to improve multilateral military cooperation among their countries in order to coherently meet the emerging security challenges and jointly defeat the menace of terrorism.

In his address, Gen Raheel said the porous western border and existence of some exploitable spaces, inadequate border management allowing terrorists movement, lack of synergy, coordination and institutionalised mechanism of intelligence sharing still remained challenges. Those challenges, he added, were being exploited through confrontational and subversive approaches by hostile intelligence agencies like RAW that spilled blood of innocent people through indirect strategy.

He said Pakistan’s counterterrorism efforts had turned the tide against terrorism in the country. Pakistan, he added, was the biggest victim of terrorism, both in terms of human lives and finances.

Elaborating the concept and success of the Operation Zarb-i-Azb, he said Pakistan’s security forces had valiantly fought against terrorists and their abettors, financiers and sympathisers through an across-the-board indiscriminate operation.

Gen Raheel said that with unflinching support of the entire nation, terrorists’ ideologies and their narrative had been defeated and their sanctuaries and hideouts completely eliminated. “Our efforts against residual threat are still continuing, and cannot be entirely eliminated without optimum cooperation between neighbouring countries,” he added.

He said: “The success of our counterterrorism operation is a common dividend, which should be optimised and shared.”

The army chief offered to benefit from Pakistan’s initiative and experiences in terms of regulation of cross-border movement, socio-economic development of border regions and enhanced cooperation in terms of intelligence sharing.

He also offered unlimited and sustained support to all the countries participating in the conference, particularly Afghanistan. He emphasised that the route to a peaceful and prosperous region ran through a stable Afghanistan, which was achievable through a comprehensive and coordinated approach.

Published in Dawn, September 27th, 2016