JUI-F chief urges defence forces to 'stay out of politics'

JUI-F chief Maulana Fazlur Rehman has said Pakistan's defence forces should remain strictly in a defensive capacity and must not function as a political force, stressing that political power was the right of the people and elected politicians, not the military.

The cleric-politician also opposed the deployment of Pakistani troops to Palestine as part of the Gaza stabilisation force.

He was speaking to journalists in Karachi alongside Kamran Khan Tessori on Monday.

Welcoming improvements in defence posture, Fazl said the country's defensive capacity had improved and should be maintained.

However, he stressed that defence forces should be strong for defence purposes only, not as a political force.

"Political strength is not the right of defence institutions; it belongs to the people and politicians," he said, adding that political institutions must be strengthened and that national progress depended on constitutional supremacy rather than the dominance of one institution over another.

The JUI-F chief also touched upon Pakistan's Afghanistan policy, saying that it should not be assessed only through recent incidents in which terrorists crossed the border and carried out attacks, but should instead be reviewed over the span of the past 78 years.

Lamenting that no Afghan government had ever been friendly towards Pakistan, he questioned whether this pointed to a failure of Pakistan's own policy. From the era of King Zahir Shah to that of Ashraf Ghani, he said Pakistan had not seen a friendly Afghan government.

"If we merely construct our own narrative, we will continue to place the blame on them," he said, adding that Pakistan must also look inward and debate whether its Afghan policy itself had failed.

The Maulana also denounced recent constitutional and legal amendments.