Off the net: Army, ISI chiefs not on social media

Only DG ISPR Maj Gen Asim Saleem Bajwa has a Twitter, Facebook account

ISLAMABAD: There is no official social media networking accounts of army chief General Raheel Sharif and ISI chief Lt Gen Rizwan Akhtar, the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) said in a statement on Wednesday.  “It is clarified that COAS and DG ISI do not have any Facebook or Twitter accounts,” it added. “There is only one Twitter and one Facebook account of the military spokesman/DG ISPR Maj Gen Asim Saleem Bajwa. Military spokesman/DG ISPR’s Twitter account is @AsimBajwaISPR and Facebook account is www.facebook.com/AsimBajwaISPR [General Asim Bajwa].”  Last month, the army lodged an official complaint with the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) to remove fake accounts attributed to the senior military officials. Subsequently, the PTA had removed certain accounts but such fake accounts have kept reappearing on the social networking sites.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 8^th, 2014.