US Senators laud Pakistan's anti-terrorism efforts

WASHINGTON: Chief of Army Staff General Raheel Sharif on Thursday met with members of US Senate Committee on Intelligence to discuss regional security and counter-terrorism strategy.

The director general of Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), Lt Gen Asim Bajwa, informed through a series of tweets that the committee chairman Richard Burr and vice chairman Dianne Feinstein lauded Pakistan’s sacrifices in anti-terror war and the country’s anti-terrorism strategy which resulted in decline of such incidents on its soil.

Earlier on Monday,Raheel Sharif met CIA chief John Brennan and discussed security challenges facing the region and the way forward to confront these.

The army chief stressed the need for a conducive environment in the region for re-initiating an Afghan-led and Afghan-owned peace and reconciliation process while the CIA director acknowledged the accomplishments of Zarb-i-Azb and its positive impact on the security calculus.

While on Tuesday, army chief met US Secretary of Defence Ashton Carter and Deputy Secretary of Defence Robert O. Work, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (CJCS) Gen Joseph Dunford, Army Chief of Staff Gen Mark Milley and Centcom (Central Command) chief Gen Lloyd Austin.

During the meetings, Gen Raheel and American officials discussed defence cooperation between US and Pakistan and the need for enhanced defence coordination.

The army chief is in the United States on a five-day visit, in a trip analysts have said will underscore security issues facing Islamabad and Washington in the region as well as the dynamics relating to civilian-military ties within Pakistan.

After spending five days in Washington, the army chief would go to Brazil on a three-day visit for talks on cooperation between the two militaries. From Brazil, he will go to Ivory Coast to spend a day with Pakistani troops who were serving there as part of the UN peace keeping force.

The US Department of Defence said on Monday Washington was grateful that the COAS was visiting the US for consultations on bilateral issues, Dawn newspaper reported.

The visit comes weeks after Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif met with US President Barack Obama at the Oval Office to discuss many of the same issues said to be on his army chief's agenda, including Afghan peace talks and Pakistan's nuclear ambitions.https://twitter.com/AsimBajwaISPR/status/667324314040082433?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw