Profile: Brigadier Mustafa Kamal Barki

Brigadier Mustafa Kamal Barki was one of the most highly-trained and gallant intelligence officers of the premier Pakistani spy agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI). He mastered the craft of modern intelligence and neutralised every design of Pakistan’s enemies and their allies. On March 21, 2023, he joined the brave soldiers of Pakistan who sacrificed theirs lives for the motherland.

Brigadier Mustafa Kamal Barkihad had an encounter with terrorists in the Angoor Adda area of South Waziristan on March 21 this year. Geographically, South Waziristan is a mountainous region bordering Afghanistan and it has long been infested with militants.

The Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), the media affairs wing of the Pakistan Army, said that Brigadier Barki and his soldiers put up a heroic resistance against terrorists during the encounter. In this deadly ambush, Brigadier Barkiand his soldiers were martyred. Brigadier Barkihas left behind his wife, a daughter, and a son.

As a brave army officer, Brigadier Barki remained involved in counter terrorism operations and successfully dismantled numerous terrorist networks in Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan provinces. It was Brigadier Barkiwho traced and neutralised the terrorist network involved in the APS attack in 2014wherein hundreds of Pakistani schoolchildren were martyred.

BrigMustafa Kamal Barkigot commission in the Frontier Force Regiment of the Pakistan Army on October 12, 1995. 

Recently, Pakistani security forces conducted numerous operations against terrorists across the country, arrested several terrorists and their facilitators, and foiled many terrorist attacks. In consequence, two ISI officials, Director Naveed SadiqSial and Inspector Nasir Abbas, were martyred in a gun attack in the Pirowalarea of Khanewal a few weeks ago. BrigBarki is the second high-ranking ISI official who has embraced martyrdom in an ambush within a few weeks.

Brig Barkiwas buried at the army graveyard with full military honours. President Arif Alvi, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee (CJCSC) General SahirShamshad Mirza, Chief of Army Staff (COAS) General Syed Asim Munir, Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) DG Lieutenant General Nadeem Ahmed Anjum, a large number of serving and retired military officers and soldiers, government officials, parliamentarians and locals attended Brig Barki’s funeral prayers at the Racecourse in Rawalpindi.

To express solidarity, a grand jirga announced three-day mourning on the tragic demise of Brig Barki.

Nisar Barki, a cousin of Brig. Mustafa Kamal Barki described him as a “caring person”.He said Brig Barki received his early education at a school in his hometown and then got admission to an educational institution in Tank.

“We studied together up to 12th grade and were even together at Cadet College Razmak in North Waziristan,” he said. “After completing his education there, Mustafa was selected by a medical college and Pakistan’s Military Academy, but he preferred to join the army.”He said that his cousin joined the Frontier Force Regiment in 1995 and served in various capacities. He was also posted abroad to work with different Pakistani diplomatic missions.

BrigBarkiwas a graduate of the National Defence University and Command and Staff College, Quetta. Distinctively, he participated in the KargilWar and suffered injuries.