Chief of Army Staff (COAS) General Asim Munir blamed the “soft state” on Tuesday for the deaths of innocent people amid an increase in terror attacks nationwide, especially in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan. He also questioned how long the military would continue to fill the “gaps of governance” with the blood of martyrs.
The army commander remarked, “We need better governance… we should make Pakistan a hard state,” during a high-level in-camera meeting of the Parliamentary Committee on National Security. The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) and other key opposition parties did not attend the meeting.
Rising terrorism in Pakistan, including a significant terrorist attack on a passenger train in the Mushqaf neighborhood of the Bolan region in Balochistan, was the backdrop for the in-camera discussion.
