Defence Minister Khurram Dastgir Khan was given the additional portfolio of Foreign Ministry on Friday.
The post of foreign minister was vacated following Khawaja Asif’s disqualification on April 26. The former foreign minister was disqualified by the Islamabad High Court under Article 62 (1)(f) of constitution for failing to disclose his employment in a UAE company and the monthly salary he was receiving.
Dastgir was given the post of defence minister in August 2017 when Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi formed a new cabinet following Nawaz Sharif’s ouster.
The Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) lawmaker from Gujranwala had served as the minister for commerce from 2014 to 2017. Dastgir studied engineering at California Institute of Technology and economics at Bowdoin College before being elected to National Assembly in 2008.
After his re-election to the National Assembly in 2013, he was appointed minister for state for science and technology, minister of state for privatisation and minister of state for commerce until he was made minister for commerce in 2014.
Published in Daily Times, May 12th 2018.
