Lieutenant General Rizwan Akhtar ( ur, ) is a former
three-star rank
Pakistan Army general. He is a former spymaster who served as
Director General of the ISI.
He served from 8 November 2014 to 11 December 2016. On 8 Oct 2017, he announced his pre-mature retirement from the army.
Military career
Rizwan Akhtar was commissioned in the
Pakistan Army
The Pakistan Army (, ) is the Army, land service branch of the Pakistan Armed Forces. The roots of its modern existence trace back to the British Indian Army that ceased to exist following the partition of India, Partition of British India, wh ...
in the
Frontier Force Regiment in September 1982. He commanded an infantry brigade and infantry division in the
Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) after serving as Operation and Planning Officer at
Peshawar Corps.
As
Director General
A director general or director-general (plural: ''directors general'', ''directors-general'', ''director generals'' or ''director-generals''
) or general director is a senior executive (government), executive officer, often the chief executive offi ...
of the
Pakistan Rangers in Sindh, Major General Rizwan Akhtar had been assigned with the task to lead the Karachi operation. Akhtar is also considered to have extensive experience of counterinsurgency from a previous posting in the border region of
South Waziristan. After getting promoted to the rank of
Lieutenant General in September 2014, he was posted as
Director General of the ISI. He was the President of the
National Defence University but took pre-mature retirement from the army in October 2017.
Academic career
Rizwan Akhtar is a graduate of the Command and Staff College in
Quetta,
National Defense University, Islamabad (NDU) and
United States Army War College,
Pennsylvania,
USA. At the US Army War College, Akhtar authored a strategy research project report titled ‘US-Pakistan trust deficit and the war on terror’ in fulfillment of the requirements of the Master in Strategic Studies Degree.
Awards and decorations
Foreign decorations
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Akhtar, Rizwan
Living people
Pakistani generals
Frontier Force Regiment officers
Directors General of Inter-Services Intelligence
National Defence University, Pakistan alumni
Pakistani spies
Year of birth missing (living people)
Recipients of Hilal-e-Shujaat