Coalition seeks new foreign secretary before departure

The government is likely to appoint a new foreign secretary before completing its term in the second week of August, official sources said on Tuesday.

Incumbent Foreign Secretary, Asad Majeed Khan, is set to retire on August 17, just days after the tenure of the current National Assembly ends.

Since the foreign secretary is a key position and cannot be left vacant; therefore, the government has decided to appoint a new foreign secretary before it leaves the office.

If sources are to be believed Dr Cyrus Qazi, special secretary at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, will be appointed as the new foreign secretary.

Cyrus is the frontrunner and has been waiting for the top slot since Asad Majeed was appointed as foreign secretary in December last year. Asad would serve foreign secretary for eight months.

He was the Pakistani ambassador in Washington, who sent the cipher in March 2022 after meeting a senior US official. The cipher was used by the then prime minister Imran Khan as evidence to propagate his “foreign conspiracy” theory, seeking the ouster of his government.

The secret diplomatic cable suggested that the US administration was not happy with the government of prime minister Imran Khan and wanted his removal through the vote of no confidence. Washington has repeatedly denied the charges.

The government wanted to appoint Asad as foreign secretary in September 2022, when Sohail Mahmood relinquished the charge but instead it had given the additional charge to Jauhar Saleem.

The reason the government did not appoint a full-time foreign secretary was because the then army chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa had reservations over Asad’s nomination.

However, Asad was finally appointed as the foreign secretary in December days after General Bajwa retired. It was believed that Asad was appointed on the recommendation of the Pakistan Peoples Party. Asad served with Asif Ali Zardari when he was the president of the country and also was deputy head of mission when Sherry Rehman was Pakistan’s envoy to the US.