Pakistan's former army chief Raheel Sharif to speak at WEF

Pakistan's former army chief Gen (retd) Raheel Sharif will speak at the annual meeting of World Economic Forum in Switzerland, discussing security issues.

This is the first time that a former army chief of Pakistan has been invited to speak at the WEF, The Express Tribune reported. In the past, Gen Pervez Musharraf also addressed the forum but as the head of a state.

Raheel would highlight Pakistan Army's counter-insurgency operations and improved security environment in the country as well as in the region besides discussing opportunities under multi-billion China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) project.

The annual WEF meetings will start from January 17 and continue for four days.

He will address three sessions of the WEF in addition to speaking at as many events arranged on the sidelines of the sessions. This includes a dinner by Munich Security Conference.

Defence Minister Khawaja Asif last week said that Raheel had been appointed as the commander of the Saudi-led 39-nation military coalition to combat terrorism.

Later, he backtracked from his statement and said Raheel did not seek government's permission before joining the Saudi-led alliance.

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif will lead the Pakistani delegation to the meeting, which will be chaired jointly by Brian T Moynihan of the Bank of America, award-winning documentary maker Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy, Helle Thorning- Schmidt, Frans van Houten and Meg Whitman, reports said.