Emergency-Articles & Commentaries

Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto and the Pakistan Peoples Party
By Senator Dr Javaid Laghari

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The People Are With Bhutto, Says Catholic Bishop

The People Are With Bhutto, Says Bishop
Comments on Unrest in Pakistan

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, NOV. 21, 2007, - Although Pakistan's Supreme Court dismissed challenges to President Pervez Musharraf's re-election, the bishop of Islamabad says the masses are with opposition leader Benazir Bhutto.

On Monday a bench of 10 new judges, hand-picked by Musharraf in recent days, struck down five challenges to the president's re-election, and will rule Thursday on a sixth and final petition.
 
Addressing the crisis and asked whether he thinks there remains any hope of restoring an independent voice within the court, Bishop Anthony Theodore Lobo said "the new judges are subservient so their judgment is a foregone conclusion; they'll support everything the government wants."

He added that "the old Supreme Court judges were independent -- but they have been removed."
 
Opposition
The Supreme Court decision comes a day after Musharraf announced he would ask for a parliamentary election for Jan. 8.
 
 Bhutto, the opposition leader and former prime minister, announced that she is not yet sure whether to participate in the polls as she doubts the election will be fair. She added that she will no longer participate in negotiations with Musharraf due to a complete lack of trust.

In retaliation, Musharraf criticized the former prime minister and said she fears the polls because she is corrupt and unpopular.

Bishop Lobo disagreed; he noted that "Benazir has come to the forefront -- all the headlines in the newspapers are [...] showing Benazir."

Asked to elaborate about Bhutto's role in the general opposition to Musharraf's rule, Bishop Lobo said, "The masses are with Bhutto."

Unrest
 
Musharraf declared emergency rule on Nov. 3 and promptly purged the Supreme Court of judges he feared would ultimately annul his re-election.
 

Although he has since vowed to quit as army chief and become a civilian president, Musharraf remains under fire from Western allies for having set back democracy in the country.
 
As civil society activists today kept up their calls for a return to democracy and for the constitution to be reinstated, ongoing sectarian violence across the country continued to claim lives -- with over 80 people dying in a single clash near the Afghan border.
In the face of the emergency, Bishop Lobo explained that all sides believe by imposing their will they are doing what's best for the good of the nation.
 

However some analysts are arguing that ethnic nationalist and religious divisions are growing to the point where the country may soon fracture.
 

When asked how the Catholic community is coping with the extreme conditions, Bishop Lobo said, "We are not the targets; it is a battle between the democrats and the autocrats."

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Bush urges immediate end to emergency

WASHINGTON, Nov 19: The White House said on Monday that President George W. Bush would like to see the emergency rule in Pakistan lifted immediately. The White House also said that Mr Bush’s first official engagement at seven this morning was with Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte who briefed him on his meeting with President Pervez Musharraf.

Mr Negroponte visited Islamabad this weekend with a message from Mr Bush, asking the Pakistani leader to lift the state of emergency he imposed on Nov 3. Gen Musharraf refused to do so.

“I don’t have a date to give you,” said White House Press Secretary Dana Perino when asked if Mr Bush will allow this emergency situation to go on before taking some kind of action.

“I can tell you that the President is urging the lifting of the emergency order immediately, and the release of people who have been detained who were trying to express their views,” she added.

At the State Department, spokesman Sean McCormack stressed that the United States had invested in Pakistan and its people rather than in Gen Musharraf.

Asked if Mr Bush made a mistake in investing so much in Gen Musharraf and would he now like to see another person leading Pakistan, Mr McCormack said the United States had not invested in any individual. “But we have an investment in the relationship with Pakistan and the Pakistani people,” he said, adding that “we continue to provide advice and counsel from the position of friendship”.

The spokesman said that President Musharraf was “a good friend and ally” but who leads Pakistan “ultimately is going to be a decision for Pakistan and the Pakistani people. We don’t pick and choose who leads Pakistan.”

Mr McCormack said the United States was opposing the state of emergency because it believed “the results in part from these actions were not in our interests”.

At the White House, Ms Perino said in diplomatic efforts like the one Mr Negroponte undertook there’re no immediate results. “So we are going to continue to have an open line of communication and dialogue. Deputy Secretary Negroponte said that he delivered a very clear message, and we’ll have to continue to monitor the situation as it evolves, to see what happens next,” she added.

Ms Perino welcomed Gen Musharraf’s assurances that the elections would be held on time and he would remove his uniform as promised as good steps. But “we remain concerned that there has not been a lifting of the emergency order that he put in place a little over two weeks ago,” she added.

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Emergency must end for free polls: US envoy (Negroponte)

ISLAMABAD, Nov 18: US Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte on Sunday called upon the government to end emergency rule and create an environment for credible elections.

“Emergency rule is not compatible with free, fair and credible elections, which require active participation of political parties, civil society and the media. The people of Pakistan deserve an opportunity to choose their leaders free from the restrictions that exist under a state of emergency,” he said at a press conference at the United States embassy here before flying back to Washington after a two-day visit to Pakistan.

He observed that recent police actions against protesters, suppression of the media and arrests of political and human rights leaders ran counter to the reforms undertaken in recent years. Their continuation undermined the progress Pakistan had made.

He urged the government to stop such actions, lift the state of emergency and release all political detainees.

Despite President Pervez Musharraf’s refusal to lift emergency until the law and order situation improved, Mr Negroponte said he would not characterise his trip as a failure. It was an opportunity to communicate concerns, he added.

“In diplomacy, as you know, we don’t get instant replies when we have these kinds of dialogue. I am sure the president is seriously considering the exchange we had,” he remarked.

He hoped to see more steps toward democracy soon. “There remain some other issues that are yet to be considered, or yet to be undertaken,” he said.

He said the US wanted to see the political process in Pakistan back on track as soon as possible. He expressed the hope that ‘other steps’ would be taken soon to ensure free and fair elections.

He declined to answer a question about the possibility of suspension of US aid if the state of emergency was not lifted.

Mr Negroponte said that during his meeting with President Musharraf he had reiterated his vision for a moderate, prosperous and democratic Pakistan. Under his leadership, Pakistan had made great progress toward that vision. Over the past few years, the Pakistani people had witnessed an expanded and free media, unprecedented economic growth and development and the moderation of gender-based laws and school curricula. President Musharraf had been and continued to be a strong voice against extremism. “We value our partnership with the government of Pakistan under the leadership of President Musharraf,” he stressed.

He welcomed President Musharraf’s announcement that elections would take place in January, saying that he had reiterated the commitment in categorical terms.

“He also repeated his commitment to retire from his army post before commencing his second presidential term and we urge him to do so as soon as possible,” Mr Negroponte said.

He expressed the desire to see Gen Musharraf and Pakistan People’s Party chairperson Benazir Bhutto resuming talks. “If steps are taken by both sides to move back toward the kind of reconciliation discussions they were having recently, we think that would be very positive and could help improve the political environment,” he said.

He said the best way for any country to counter violent extremism was to develop and nurture a moderate political centre. That was true for Pakistan as well and in his talks he had encouraged reconciliation among political moderates as the most constructive way forward, adding that the path of reconciliation was desirable for meaningful elections.

He said a democratic Pakistan that continued the fight against terror was vital to the interests of both the US and Pakistan.

“In the current circumstances, engagement and dialogue – not brinksmanship and confrontation – should be the order of the day for all parties.” The US supported Pakistani people in their efforts to develop a prosperous and democratic nation.

Answering a question, he said the US was concerned over religious militancy in the NWFP and it believed that it would take some time for Islamabad to overcome the unrest.

Pakistan faced challenges in Swat where pro-Taliban militants loyal to a radical cleric had made sweeping gains over the past few months. “It is yet another reason to be concerned about the situation in Pakistan. The situation in Swat is a reminder of the fact that there are issues to deal with regarding violent extremists in this country.”

He said the government was undertaking major efforts to deal with the situation. He said it was a matter of high priority for both the countries and the US support to Pakistan in this regard would continue.

He said the determined efforts of extremists were there, but there was no reason to doubt the commitment of the government, the army and the security forces.

Call rejected

Pakistan on Sunday dismissed a call by America’s No 2 diplomat for President Gen Pervez Musharraf to restore the constitution and free thousands of political opponents, saying that the US envoy had brought no new proposals and received no assurances in return.

“This is nothing new,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammed Sadiq told The Associated Press, referring to Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte’s warning that Gen Musharraf must end emergency rule as soon as possible. “The US has been saying this for many days. He has said that same thing. He has reiterated it.”—AP

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Bhutto Unshackled
ByARYN BAKER / LAHORE

Former Prime Minister of Pakistan Benazir Bhutto and her personal assistant sit under house arrest in Lahore.

Sarah Caron / Polaris for TIME

What on earth did she see in him? For the duration of her short-lived marriage of convenience to President Pervez Musharraf, Benazir Bhutto's friends and political rivals wondered how she, a populist democrat, could live with him, a military dictator. The mystery deepened when Musharraf declared a state of emergency and began a massive crackdown on democratic institutions--and Bhutto responded with only mild criticism, refusing to rule out a power-sharing arrangement with him. Some said her motivation was pure self-interest: she was that desperate to return to power. Others bought Bhutto's explanation that a deal with Musharraf would allow Pakistan a smooth transition to democracy. And conspiracy theorists concluded that she had agreed to join him only at the insistence of their matchmaker, the Bush Administration.

When she ended their dysfunctional dalliance on Nov. 13--Bhutto announced she would not work under Musharraf and demanded his immediate resignation--her political rivals were just as relieved as her friends. It meant that the deeply unpopular dictator would be denied his last political lifeline. "It's impossible to work with him," Bhutto told journalists by telephone. Just as important, the opposition to his increasingly autocratic rule, led primarily by lawyers and human-rights activists, would be massively strengthened by the backing of a political leader with national, grass-roots support. "Bhutto has finally come to our side," says Ahsan Iqbal, spokesman for the Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz party, which is led from exile by Bhutto's longtime foe, former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. "There can now be a common agenda. With complete unanimity of goals, there is no reason why we can't all come together to get rid of Musharraf."

This is not reassuring news for the Bush Administration, which continues to regard Musharraf as a vital ally in the war on terrorism. But if Washington is constrained by its ties to the dictator, Bhutto is now liberated. And she has the opportunity many politicians crave: a chance to redefine herself. Having inherited her political mantle from her father Zulfikar--sent to the gallows by a previous military ruler--she has often been labeled a child of privilege, haughty and aloof from ordinary Pakistanis. Her two stints as Prime Minister were plagued with ineptitude and accusations--which she denied--of massive graft. Indeed, she fled Pakistan eight years ago to escape corruption charges and returned only after Musharraf agreed to drop them as part of their deal. Now she can claim the leadership of a popular uprising against a dictator--and potentially wipe clean her own record.

But first she will face a wall of skepticism from those who have been at the front lines of the uprising while she has hogged headlines in the rear. In recent weeks, critics have laughed off Bhutto's halfhearted opposition to Musharraf, pointing out that while other leaders and lawyers languished behind bars, she was able to roam free, host diplomatic receptions and broadcast her press conferences on state-run TV. But when Bhutto called for protest rallies and a march from Lahore to the capital, Islamabad, she too was placed under house arrest. The final straw, she says, was when Musharraf's forces rounded up thousands of her supporters across the country in advance of the planned march. "It left my party with the conclusion that he does not really want to do business with us," she told journalists. "It made it clear that he was using us as icing on the cake to make sure no one notices the cake was poisoned." Some analysts believe she may simply have made the political calculation that Musharraf had grown too unpopular to stay in office for very long--and that by breaking away from him she could have the power without the sharing.

But the general has shown through his eight years in power that he is nothing if not tenacious. If the deal is off, so too are his gloves. Bhutto can no longer expect any special treatment from Musharraf and could find herself in the same position as other opposition politicians--in jail or in exile again. The crackdown on her Pakistan People's Party will probably intensify. Musharraf "is capable of doing anything now," says Iftikhar Gilani, a former law minister under Bhutto who also has been a member of the general's party. "He has already confronted the press, the judiciary and the lawyers. Now he will attack the political parties, and they have large followings across Pakistan. There will be chaos."

That's a disturbing scenario for the Bush Administration, which was counting on the Musharraf-Bhutto deal to keep Pakistan stable. Many in Washington worry that the general is getting progressively heavy-handed and dictatorial. "Musharraf is digging in," says Stephen Cohen, a South Asia expert and senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. "He is either suicidal or totally ignorant of the situation." Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice have both telephoned Musharraf and urged him to ease up. Rice is sending her deputy, John D. Negroponte, to Islamabad to try to hold the general to his promise to step down as army chief at the end of November, lift the emergency degree and hold elections in early January. Negroponte will also try to revive the Musharraf-Bhutto deal, but some in the Administration recognize that can no longer be the only option. "If it becomes more and more clear that [Musharraf] is not budging," says a Western diplomat in Islamabad, "then certainly you start thinking of alternatives."

If Bhutto won't deal, then the U.S. may turn to the Pakistani military, which receives $150 million a month in American aid. "The best way to get Musharraf out," says an Administration official close to the current discussions on Pakistan, "is to prevail on his other colleagues in the military to remove him." The most obvious successor, Vice Chief of Army Staff General Ashfaq Kyani, is deeply loyal to Musharraf--but the Western diplomat is quick to point out that Kyani once worked with Bhutto as her military secretary and that he was involved in the early stages of negotiating her deal with his boss. Bhutto must know that she cannot return to power without the endorsement of the military, the country's most powerful and enduring institution. Pakistani Realpolitik dictates that she may have to rebound from Musharraf into a relationship with another general.

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MUSHARRAF SHUTS DOWN GEO TV 

ISLAMABAD: GEO TV, Pakistan's premier Urdu news channel, also seen round the world as the main source of news and current affairs, was shut down at 1 a.m. Pakistan time (12 midnight Dubai time) after President Pervez Musharraf put tremendous pressure to silence a media outlet which had refused to bow down to his dictates.

Informed sources said President Pervez Musharraf himself intervened to stop all GEO news transmissions from Dubai, after a two-week standoff in Pakistan during which all major news channels were shut down by cable operators, who are directly controlled by the Pakistani authorities. 

The shutting down of the Geo News was universally condemned by almost every political party and member of the civil society minutes before the anchors, almost in tears, signed off. 

PML-N leader Mian Nawaz Sharif told Dr. Shahid Masood on telephone from London it was a tragic moment in Pakistan's history as the Musharraf regime was bent upon destroying every symbol of free speech and democracy in the country. 

Makhdoon Amin Faheem, the PPP Vice Chairman told Geo News, in its dying moments, that it would be a tragedy for the country and democracy if Geo went off the air, which it did minutes later. 

Lt. General Talat Masood, Retired Chief Justice Saeeduzzaman Siddiqi and many others representing the civil society, who used to appear regular in Geo talk shows, expressed shock and disgust at the decision to shut of Geo TV. 

Popular news anchors came on Geo News around midnight Pakistan time to announce that their channel had been ordered to go off the air as result of the continued deadlock between the Pakistani authorities and the media channels, following the imposition of the emergency in the country. 

In Pakistan all GEO channels were blocked by the military regime after the imposition of the emergency but on Friday two main channels, DAWN News and AAJ were back on air, with AAJ announcing that two its most popular talks shows, hosted by Talat Hussain, Nusrat Javeed and Mushtaq Mihas, were suspended temporarily. 

Geo News was shut down because it had refused to budge. After six years of objective and highly professional telecasts, which earned the channel the honour of being the most popular TV channel, the Government of Pakistan put it off the air on Nov 4 after emergency was imposed. 

Geo News was under pressure from day one. The government tried to bring it down but the channel became a household name in Pakistan and abroad and was declared by the international observers as the most watched and popular TV channel. 

Its role in the judicial crisis, which started on March 9, when the President filed a reference against the Chief Justice, was highly applauded, domestically and internationally. 

Geo kept the whole world informed about the developments regarding the events unfolding during the struggle of people of Pakistan for restoration of dignity of the judiciary through its objective reporting by giving all points of view. The programmes, talks shows and commentaries produced by Geo created an impact and awareness among the people. 

Sources said the government first asked the Geo administration to stop the most popular programmes of popular TV hosts Dr. Shahid Masood, Hamid Mir and Kamran Khan without offering any tangible reason why they should be stopped. 

After the success of the Chief Justice campaign all private news channels were banned from telecasting live programmes and filming outside the studios. 

The media workers protested against the move and the government had to accept the demands of the media workers. The shows were allowed to continue but live coverage was banned. 

In the meanwhile General Pervez Musharraf kept on resorting to pressure tactics and the Geo channels revenue sources were targeted. 

Under his orders all government advertisements were not only stopped but other commercial advertisers were also pressurized not to give business to Geo. The channel withstood all the pressures and suffered huge losses. A statement submitted in the Sindh High Court on Friday said almost Rs1 billion was lost by the channel. 

After the emergency General Musharraf banned Geo and other channels inside Pakistan. Geo stood the pressure and refused to sign on the dotted line. 

The sources pointed out that the government under General Pervez Musharraf enhanced its pressure on the media to regulate itself under the command of the administration after the clamping of emergency. 

The media was strangulated through an ordinance that placed restrictions on its freedom that had no precedent. It was virtually made impossible to carry on free journalism in the country in the presence of the said ordinance. 

A so-called code of conduct was thrust upon the media to follow without any consultations with the journalist community. Private channels were asked to sign an undertaking that would have made the channels subservient to the authorities. 

This was done after suspending all private channels of the country and the channel administrations were asked to accept the conditions and sign the document of undertaking. 

They were told to accept provisional licences instead of the permanent ones they had. The earlier licences were cancelled through the same order. 

The sources said that General Pervez Musharraf asked the channels to stop their current affairs programmes, which were not acceptable to him and demanded that anchorpersons should be fired. 

The channels who signed the document were restored on the cable. Some channels accepted the official advice while others refused to follow. 

Geo declined to oblige General Pervez Musharraf as the demands included cooperation on all points which the new caretaker government would bring up. 

It was demanded that Geo should stop the objectionable current affairs programmes and toe the official line. 

The authorities wanted that the channel should cooperate with President General Pervez Musharraf. 

The channel was further asked to submit all its programmes for monitoring by government officials, as no programme without clearance would be aired. 

The sources said that Geo was first forbidden in Pakistan through cable not brought under pressure through the authorities concerned of the country from where it was being aired. 

The channel was being seen at some places in the country through dish antennas and Internet but the government's technical experts first tried to stop it on the Internet and then a ban was placed on the import of dish antenna and relevant equipment used for receiving direct satellite signals. 

The authorities in the host country had to ask the Geo News to stop its telecast from their up-linking station under excruciating pressure coming from the Government of Pakistan without considering its long-term adverse impact on the image of the host country. 

The authorities concerned while conveying the message of the Pakistan Government to close down the channel, ridiculed the decision as they had no experience of facing such a demand which was contrary to all norms of decency and business in the modern time business culture, the sources revealed. 

Geo's voice was silenced by General Pervez Musharraf as its anchors, almost in tears, bid farewell to its viewers and listeners

Journalists march against Geo News closure (Updated at 0300)

KARACHI: The journalists including employees Geo TV Network marched from Geo office to Governor House in token protest against the closure of Geo News across the world. 

Although the march was peaceful against the complete closure of Geo News but the Police used force to stop the march. 

We are passing through critical time: Nasir Baig (Updated at 0230)

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Bhutto defiant after house arrest

Pakistani opposition leader Benazir Bhutto has renewed her calls for President Pervez Musharraf to end emergency rule.

She told reporters the new interim government that is overseeing elections was "not acceptable".

She was speaking shortly after being freed from house arrest.

US Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte has arrived in Islamabad, with Washington insisting that Gen Musharraf resign his military post.

Ms Bhutto was placed under house arrest in Lahore on Tuesday to stop her from leading a march to Islamabad.

The move was part of a huge clampdown that has seen thousands of people arrested since emergency rule was introduced on 3 November.

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Plot against Bhutto bodes ill for Pakistan
By Gul Jammas Hussain

Millions have embraced the Bhutto cult but there are millions who never did, who think its founder, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, was just a magician who invented a fake religion to mesmerize his followers.
 
 However, his believers say Bhutto was a dedicated leader with exceptional intellectual qualities who gave Pakistan its nuclear program, brought back the 93,000 soldiers captured by India after the humiliating defeat in the 1971 war, distributed feudal lands to the poor peasants, and liberated manual workers from the clutches of factory owners.
 
 From the military to the masses, from the top bureaucracy down to junior government clerks, and from powerful feudal lords to the poor country peasants, the whole country is clearly divided into two distinct factions -- one that loves the Bhuttos; and another that hates them.
 
 Those who hate them always tried to destroy them and their ideology by any means possible. They hanged Zulfikar Ali Bhutto -- the first elected prime minister of Pakistan and the founder of the Pakistan People’s Party -- but that did not satisfy them. They went on to persecute the Bhutto family and their followers.
 
 Bhutto’s daughter Benazir and wife Nusrat were arrested and placed in solitary confinement, and his son Shahnawaz was murdered under mysterious circumstances. But all this could not diminish Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s popularity, even in death.
 
 When Benazir Bhutto returned from exile in 1986, she was welcomed by a dancing, singing crowd of one million people chanting slogans like “May Bhutto live as long as the sun and stars exist.”
 
 In Pakistan there is intense love for the Bhuttos, and also intense hate for them. Their lovers and haters are both unbelievably mad people. Over the years, the intensity of their emotions has been manifested through incredible feats.
 
 While one group wants them to live forever, other groups want to see the last politically active member of the Bhutto family dead. And now Bhutto-haters have acquired new allies: the Pakistani Taleban from Waziristan and Al-Qaeda militants from the tribal areas of Pakistan and Afghanistan.
 
 On October 6, when Ms. Bhutto was preparing to return to Pakistan, Baitullah Mehsud, a militant tribal chief from the semi-autonomous region of South Waziristan, bordering Afghanistan, threatened her, saying his bombers were waiting in the wings to ‘welcome’ her when she returns to Pakistan. “My men will welcome Bhutto on her return. We do not accept General Pervez Musharraf and Benazir Bhutto, because they only protect the U.S. interests and see things through its glasses.”
 
 Mehsud, who commands a 5,000-strong private army of tribal militants, is a ruthless warlord of the mountainous region of northwest Pakistan. He is known to have close links with the Afghan Taleban, their leader Mullah Omar, and Al-Qaeda militants. He was greatly inspired by the Taleban ideology and frequently visited Afghanistan as a volunteer to join in the Taleban’s drive for the enforcement of Islamic law (shariah) in the Waziristan region.
 
 Mehsud is responsible for many deadly attacks on the security forces and recently kidnapped 300 Pakistan Army soldiers and beheaded some to show his fury over the Musharraf government’s operation against the Red Mosque of Islamabad. He is demanding the withdrawal of the security forces from South Waziristan and the release of his captured men in exchange for the soldiers’ freedom.
 
 Despite his denials, Mehsud is being blamed by many for the devastating bomb attack on Ms. Bhutto’s convoy in Karachi on October 18, just a few hours after she returned to the country. She survived the assassination attempt, but over 140 innocent people died and 550 were wounded.
 
 Ms. Bhutto believes that some hardcore elements from Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and the Pakistan Army also played a significant role in orchestrating the assassination attempt.
 
 Eight hours before boarding her flight from Dubai to Karachi, she wrote an email to UPI editor at large, Arnaud De Borchgrave, saying, “I have been informed that Baitullah Mehsud, an Afghan (sic -- he is actually a Pakistani Pushtun), Hamza Bin Laden, an Arab, and a Red Mosque militant have been sent to kill me. I wrote to (President Pervez) Musharraf telling him that if something happened, then I wanted these three held responsible -- the people who I think are behind them. I have also left a copy of the letter, in case something happens (to me), but I expect all to go smoothly.”
 
 And then a day after the carnage, talking to The Times of London, Ms. Bhutto estimated that no fewer than four different groups sought to kill her on the day she returned. “There was one suicide squad from the Taleban elements; one suicide squad from Al-Qaeda; one suicide squad from the Pakistani Taleban; and a fourth -- a group, I believe, from Karachi,” she said.
 
 And now Ms. Bhutto has received a new death threat. Senator Farooq Naik, Bhutto’s lawyer, said he had received a two-page handwritten letter in Urdu from an unidentified person threatening to kill her “by any means.” The writer claimed to be a friend of Al-Qaeda, Osama bin Laden, and the head of suicide-bombers in Pakistan.
 
 Those who want to kill Bhutto should know that people die but ideologies do not. The Zulfikar Ali Bhutto legend is an ideology that can not be killed.
 
 At this critical juncture, those who are seeking to assassinate Benazir Bhutto should reflect upon the repercussions of their plot, since it would further polarize Pakistani society, if it succeeded.

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REBUTTAL TO GPM AND THUGS OF GUJRAT
By Wajid Shamsul Hasan

Gujrat—in the province of Pakistani Punjab—has earned international notoriety for at least two things—if not more. Firstly, it is known widely what many in their reverence call “Shah Doula Dey Chohay”—men and women with shrunken heads over a large human body-- described medically as micro-encephalic children. When one looks at their sad plight, it evokes sympathy and remorse.

While not under-estimating them, one can not, however, ignore yet another ignominiously cursed breed—though in appearance normal but otherwise no better than those creatures that gnaw the society at its roots, grind their teeth into its vitals and yet take pride in being known as Choudhries otherwise popularly described as Co-operative Thugs of Gujrat.

Not that it is something despicable to be scions of a foot constable to rise in a society--from rags to riches particularly when they have used all means—fair and foul including their kinky queer habits-- what makes one take exception to them is their most outrageous attempt at drowning Punjab in their filth and stinking scum. By abusing 44 per cent of the province’s development fund in an advertising campaign to white wash their overly kala-kola image and also to re-launch a recycled dirty tricks media operation of 1990 election campaign against PPP chairperson Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto—they have started digging their own grave to be finally buried deep down under the loads of dung-heap of their misdeeds.

I am sure painful and agonising shrieks of Imran Khan’s sisters as well as brave PPP ladies, human rights workers—when pulled by their hair and dragged by the private police force raised on the pattern of Hitler’s Storm troopers by the Choudhries directly under the orders of their commando godfather—would be recorded as one of the most gory and blood curdling chapters that would make previous tortures to political dissidents bed-side tales for the kids.

The clarion call by Bhutto for a people’s revolution for the restoration of democracy, rule of law, restitution of the Chief Justice of Pakistan and other judges sacked by General Pervez Musharraf to save his second skin and to perpetuate his illegal hold on power by media blackout and Draconian clampdown on the journalists---sooner than later—would unleash the dynamics of change for the good of the country.

By returning home under direct threats of assassination by those who have wielded power for more than eight years and having survived an attempt on her life just when she landed back home to a tumultuous welcome by millions, her message to them is loud and clear—nothing can stop the caravan of democracy from reaching the goal post of its destiny. Her timely return has awakened the masses from their deep inertia inflicted on them by hunger, starvation and deprivation and they are ready for the battle to save Pakistan especially at this critical juncture when Pakistan’s mighty General has been conceding territory miles followed by miles to the conquering militants in Swat and Northern Pakistan.

When he has dragged the country to the point when it could be declared a failed state any hour, he wants more time to Viagra-ise himself through emergency so that he could do what he could not do in last eight years. In short, his is a recipe for a total disaster.

At this defining moment all the saner political elements should join hands with Bhutto to make a united effort to stop Pakistan’s slide down the eddy of doom.  

It needs to be realised that the Gujrat’s co-operative thugs, their Praetorian godfather and other political scavengers in cahoots with them, have bloated themselves on the nation’s blood. They have got addicted to it and it is running through them—instead of giving it up they are hell-bent to devour the body to the barest of its bones. One feels that Pakistan needs to be saved from these vultures first, obscurantist forces that thrived due to their patronage can be taken care of later. The masses know well that Bhutto haters are the doddering vestiges of the old order who are writhing in the last trauma and tremors and to get rid of them for good now requires one big and final push to send them rolling down never to rise again.  

A Pakistan designed to be secular and democratic by the founding fathers was perforce allowed to be hijacked by the obscurantist elements who had opposed the Quaid’s progressive and modern vision. And the land where its citizens were not to be discriminated on account of their caste, creed or colour was allowed to be fragmented by those who had opposed Mr Jinnah’s egalitarian Pakistan. And the Generals instead of surrendering to the political will of the masses and accept them as the sole arbiters of power, preferred to lay down their arms before the Indians.

Ms Bhutto’s announcement to return to Pakistan had made nights sleepless for those who had socio-economically and politically scavenged Pakistan. Ever since then and more desperately now her political adversaries—both in the corridors of power and outside—have been trying to outdo each other in distorting her image by their vicarious spins to derail her well-thought out mission to restore the supremacy of the masses.

Enormously vicious print media blitzkrieg through heavily paid huge advertisements is much more of the same that the masses have suffered through since 1970. Zulfikar Ali Bhutto was targeted then and now once again his daughter is facing the malicious propaganda on slought. All the filth that has been catapulted at the Bhuttos has fallen back direct on the face of its perpetrators. Theirs indeed, is a rare phenomenon. The more Bhuttos are character-assassinated, the more endeared they become with the masses. Almost all her adversaries—including those in the government-- joined hands to malign her political brinkmanship under different interpretations and connotations.

Even those in the media who claim to have an eye to see things that are normally opaque, could not guess. They rushed to declare that she had lost her face by agreeing to engage herself in talks for peaceful transition to democracy only to be jolted out of their firmly taken up positions by the teeming cavalcade of her “shirtless and shoeless” supporters from every nook and corner of Pakistan to converge onto Karachi to give it the look of a “mini-Pakistan” as a newspaper correspondent aptly described the look of the Quaid’s last resting place. All their calculations and estimates failed and most of them wimpishly agreed: deal or no deal, people wanted her back, to be in their midst and to lead them once again.  

Now most of her political contemporaries who did not see eye to eye with her politics—sneakily accept that she played her cards exceptionally well. As a result now to campaign against her are only the Thugs of Gujrat, Musharraf’s HMVs and those that wag their tongues and tails just to please their master with the whip. With rotten eggs spread on their faces, even likes of Shedda Tullies (not mistake him for Mark Tully) are accusing the PPP Chairperson of doing what General Pervez Musharraf has come to be internationally known as: “mother of all about turners” and “mother of service to his foreign masters”.

In their heart of hearts they know that none of the military dictators in our history has done so much for the Americans as the GPM. And there is no other reason but this “mother of all services” rendered by him to them that has made Washington—despite being fed up with him for being too much of an embarrassment for them now--to continue trying to seek a safe exit strategy for him. Indeed, the common man in the street though empty in the stomach—gets a full laugh when he hears the general now rendered into a tin-pot stutterer on the idiot box claiming that he does not accept foreign dictates—only welcomes foreign exchange. It is something like pot calling the kettle black. His band-wagoners have conveniently forgotten the fact that it were Pakistan’s military rulers who have rendered Pakistan’s sovereignty and independence into a myth and not Bhuttos.

Is it not a fact that a Pakistani prime minister had to rush to President Clinton to plead to him to save Pakistan from the dreadful fall-out consequences of the Kargil misadventure in 1999? Had the Americans not intervened effectively then, a war with India could not be averted. And indeed much earlier to that--in 1971- had not President Nixon stopped Prime Minister Indira Gandhi from advancing her conquering troops into West Pakistan after having captured 5000 square miles of Pakistani land on the western front, by now Pakistan would have become a foot note in history. It was ZAB who got back in the Simla summit what our generals had shamelessly lost in the battlefield.

It was again a Bhutto that saved Pakistan from being declared a terrorist rogue state in 1993. Even in General Zia’s time —Benazir Bhutto—considered a ‘security risk’ by him had used her good offices to save Pakistan from American sanctions.

Even his worst critics acknowledge today that ZAB had restored Pakistan’s image of honour and respect in the comity of nations by his pro-active foreign policy, his support to the Arabs and his sincere commitment to the Third World. It was General Zia who rendered this revived image of respect back to square one.

While one would have ignored with contempt the well-orchestrated media blitzkrieg launched against her following her return in which “she came, she saw and she conquered”, the lowly swipe by GPM at her showed his pathetic state of mind. One had heard much about his other inadequacies but one did not know that he suffered from what doctors call figure-blindness. Giving an interview to a foreign journalist he ridiculed the popularity that Bhutto enjoys among the masses. Having kept her illegally hostage, her house surrounded by more than 3000 police men plus an equal number in civvies, he said that she could not collect 150 people. One was reminded of a similar guffaw by him when he could not see the huge crowd at the Supreme Court through his window which was either shut or opened on the opposite side. Not only that, he also gave reasons for “her” unpopularity.  

He referred to her statements on Dr A.Q. Khan, Red Mosque and the Islamic militants, giving these the twist that only people who suffer foot-in-the-mouth disease can. His spin doctors had started shooting from their hips—to accuse her of being anti-state and of having belittled Dr A.Q. Khan. Like his now former ministers, his was an attempt at insinuating her. His ministers, it needs to be recalled, had twisted her statement that in which she had said that Dr A.Q. Khan had been singly made a scapegoat and to know the  truth as to who were the real culprits or who other beneficiaries were along with him in the nuclear money loot—she would allow IAEA access to meet Dr A.Q.Khan in Pakistan to find out the truth.  No where did she ever say that when she would come into power she would hand over Dr Khan to IAEA interrogators.

Ms Bhutto was once asked the hypothetical question whether a government led by her would cooperate with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in investigating charges against Dr. A.Q. Khan. She responded by saying that a PPP government would extend full cooperation to the International Atomic Energy Commission. This position was not very different from what Musharraf government has maintained. Her simple statement of a factual position was deliberately distorted to imply that she promised any unlawful handing over of anyone to foreigners. Rather, she has maintained that the PPP has always sought to establish rule of law and there was no question of violating Pakistani or International law in relation to the freedom and personal rights of anyone, including Dr A.Q. Khan. One may add here that to get to expose the real racketeers behind the nuclear super market she had demanded immediately institution of a by-partisan parliamentary committee to investigate. There is, indeed, something more than meets the eye that whenever there is any move to let Dr  A.Q. Khan speak out, those generals having the major share in the nuclear pie rush to shoot it down as anti-Pakistan.
 
We must remember Zulfikar Ali Bhutto preferred death than to give up his pursuit of the nuclear glow for Pakistan.

In one of his last meetings ZAB emphasised to his daughter that Pakistan’s nuclear programme should remain deterrent and at no stage transfer of technology be permitted. According to him, those opposed to it might swallow the bitter pill of a Pakistani bomb but they would unleash their wrath on Pakistan if it passes the technology onto other Muslim or friendly countries. They would not let Pakistani bomb become an Islamic bomb.

In the light of her father’s instructions she made Pakistan’s Nuclear Doctrine very clear. No export of it at any cost. It has been Benazir Bhutto’s mission to protect Pakistan’s nuclear programme. According to her, Pakistan’s nuclear programme was a matter of life and death for Pakistan. No one would be allowed to roll it back nor would be permitted to stop its further development solely as a deterrent. In her nuclear doctrine there is total ban on transfer of nuclear technology for “money or friendship”.

It is for its future protection that Bhutto has always emphasised upon the need for a investigation into the violation of Pakistan’s nuclear doctrine. It is a must to reassure the international community that Pakistan is a responsible nation and it can secure its nuclear arsenal. It will have to be done sooner than later to nip that lobby in the bud that believes that in order to attack Iran’s nuclear programme Pakistan’s shall have to be destroyed first to ensure it does not fall in the hands of Taliban and religious extremists.

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Response to "Aunt Benazir's False Promises"
ByAbid Hussain Imam

Dear Editor,

While Fatima Bhutto is critical of her aunt by whom she felt personally wronged some ten years ago, it is now the present regime that is wronging people. Fatima Bhutto is viewed by many as a pawn of our intelligence services who is being deployed today to discredit the democratic opposition, spearheaded by her aunt, Benazir Bhutto, to a government that is destroying the institutions of the country for one ultimate goal: to perpetuate the rule of one individual, who has never been democratically elected.

The issues at hand today are: the suspension of the Constitution; the declaration of the Emergency, a de facto Martial Law; the removal and arrest of the Chief Justice and the majority of the judiciary in Pakistan; the arrest of thousands of lawyers, human rights activists and political workers; the extension of the Army Act to civilians, who if they now say or are overhead saying anything critical of the Army or any member of the Armed Forces risk arrest and trial by military courts; and the suspension of all private news TV channels in an effort to suppress the media--the reversal of all of the foregoing is a prerequisite to free and fair elections.

Fatima Bhutto's vendetta can continue after the Constitution is restored and the judiciary reinstated. Provided that this regime restores the judiciary--on which everyone is in agreement--former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto will continue to face the courts, as she has done in the past ten years, and the court of the people as she has done in the past twenty. How she would fare in the court of her niece has been known by Pakistanis for some time.

Sincerely,

Abid Hussain Imam
New York, NY

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U.S. Is Looking Past Musharraf in Case He Falls
By HELENE COOPER, MARK MAZZETTI and DAVID ROHDE

This article is by Helene Cooper, Mark Mazzetti and David Rohde.
WASHINGTON, Nov. 14 — Almost two weeks into Pakistan’s political crisis, Bush administration officials are losing faith that the Pakistani president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, can survive in office and have begun discussing what might come next, according to senior administration officials.

In meetings on Wednesday, officials at the White House, State Department and the Pentagon huddled to decide what message Deputy Secretary of State John D. Negroponte would deliver to General Musharraf — and perhaps more important, to Pakistan’s generals — when he arrives in Islamabad on Friday.

Administration officials say they still hope that Mr. Negroponte can salvage the fractured arranged marriage between General Musharraf and former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto. But in Pakistan, foreign diplomats and aides to both leaders said the chances of a deal between the leaders were evaporating 11 days after General Musharraf declared de facto martial law.
Several senior administration officials said that with each day that passed, more administration officials were coming around to the belief that General Musharraf’s days in power were numbered and that the United States should begin considering contingency plans, including reaching out to Pakistan’s generals.

More than a dozen officials in Washington and Islamabad from a number of countries spoke on condition of anonymity because of the fragility of Pakistan’s current political situation. The doubts that American officials voiced about whether General Musharraf could survive were more pointed than any public statements by the administration, and signaled declining American patience in advance of Mr. Negroponte’s trip.

Officials involved in the discussions in Washington said the Bush administration remained wary of the perception that the United States was cutting back-room deals to install the next leader of Pakistan. “They don’t want to encourage another military coup, but they are also beginning to understand that Musharraf has become part of the problem,” said one former official with knowledge of the debates inside the Bush administration.

That shift in perception is significant because for six years General Musharraf has sought to portray himself, for his own purposes, as the West’s best alternative to a possible takeover in Pakistan by radical Islamists.
While remote areas in northwestern Pakistan remain a haven for Al Qaeda and other Islamic militants, senior officials at the White House, the State Department and the Pentagon now say they recognize that the Pakistani Army remains a powerful force for stability in Pakistan, and that there is little prospect of an Islamic takeover if General Musharraf should fall.

If General Musharraf is forced from power, they say, it would most likely be in a gentle push by fellow officers, who would try to install a civilian president and push for parliamentary elections to produce the next prime minister, perhaps even Ms. Bhutto, despite past strains between her and the military.
Many Western diplomats in Islamabad said they believed that even a flawed arrangement like that one was ultimately better than an oppressive and unpopular military dictatorship under General Musharraf.

Such a scenario would be a return to the diffuse and sometimes unwieldy democracy that Pakistan had in the 1990s before General Musharraf seized power in a bloodless coup.
But the diplomats also warned that removing the general might not be that easy. Army generals are unlikely to move against General Musharraf unless certain “red lines” are crossed, such as countrywide political protests or a real threat of a cutoff of American military aid to Pakistan.

Since he invoked emergency powers on Nov. 3, General Musharraf has successfully used a huge security crackdown to block large-scale protests. Virtually all major opposition politicians have been detained, as well as 2,500 party workers, lawyers and human rights activists, and on Wednesday, a close aide to General Musharraf said the Pakistani leader remained convinced that emergency rule should continue.

Pakistan’s cadre of elite generals, called the corps commanders, have long been kingmakers inside the country. At the top of that cadre is Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, General Musharraf’s designated successor as army chief. General Kayani is a moderate, pro-American infantry commander who is widely seen as commanding respect within the army and, within Western circles, as a potential alternative to General Musharraf.

General Kayani and other military leaders are widely believed to be eager to pull the army out of politics and focus its attention purely on securing the country.
Senior administration officials in Washington said they were concerned that the longer the constitutional crisis in Pakistan continued, the more diverted Pakistan’s army would be from the mission the United States wants it focused on: fighting terrorism in the country’s border areas.

The officials said there was growing worry in Washington that the situation unfolding in the mountainous region of Swat, where Islamic militants sympathetic to the Taliban and Al Qaeda are battling Pakistan’s Army, was a sign that General Musharraf — and the Pakistani Army — might be too busy jailing political opponents to fight militants.
The administration officials said they were also dismayed that General Musharraf last week released 25 militants in exchange for 213 soldiers captured by militants in August, and agreed to withdraw soldiers from certain areas of South Waziristan.

Since spring, concern has been growing in the armed forces that General Musharraf’s battle to remain in power and his recent political blunders have cost him popularity with the public and damaged the reputation of the armed forces, Western and Pakistani military analysts say.
The army’s poor performance battling militants in the country’s rugged tribal areas in the northwest has placed enormous strain on the army as well. Hundreds of soldiers have died, dozens have surrendered without a fight and militants have carried out beheadings to demoralize the force.

“The army is getting more and more concerned and worried and disturbed,” said Talat Masood, a retired general and political analyst. “They have a genuine engagement in the tribal belt of Frontier Province and Baluchistan,” he said, referring to armed clashes. “And now they have such a major confrontation between the military and civil sectors of society, and the lines are getting sharper.”
While the military supports the emergency, it is doing so with caution, and there are red lines the army will not cross, Western military officials in Pakistan said. “Kayani is loyal to Musharraf,” said one Western military official. “But also to Pakistan.”

One red line the military would probably not be prepared to cross would be if it were called on to maintain internal security anywhere beyond the areas of the insurgency. If widespread political protests were to emerge, the army could be called out to enforce law and order.
While no large-scale protests have emerged since the emergency was declared, the apparent collapse over the last week of American-backed talks to create a power-sharing deal between Ms. Bhutto and General Musharraf could lead to more street confrontations, diplomats said.

As General Musharraf has refused to lift his emergency declaration, lawmakers in Washington have stepped up threats to freeze aid payments to Islamabad.
“There is widespread disapproval in Congress of these actions,” said Representative Nita M. Lowey, a New York Democrat who is on the House Appropriations Committee. “As long as the emergency rule continues, I don’t know if we can provide direct cash assistance to the Musharraf government.”
But other top Democrats say they are wary about endorsing cuts in aid, citing concern that it could undermine efforts to fight Al Qaeda in Pakistan. And the Western military official in Pakistan warned that an aid cutoff could anger Pakistan’s army.

Other experts argue that pressure could build on General Musharraf if the corps commanders believed that the president’s actions threatened the $1 billion in annual aid Washington provides to Pakistan’s military.
“The military is pretty demoralized right now,” said Christine Fair, a Pakistan analyst in Washington. “But what keeps Musharraf in the position he is in with the military is the huge largess from the United States.”
David Rohde and Carlota Gall reported from Islamabad, Pakistan, and Thom Shanker contributed from Washington.

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Bhutto: Time for Musharraf to go

LAHORE, Pakistan -- Former Pakistan Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto called on President Gen. Pervez Musharraf to immediately step down in the wake of a mass crackdown on the opposition this week.

"It's time for him to leave," said Bhutto in a phone interview with CNN Tuesday morning, as Pakistani riot police arrested her supporters. It marked the first time she has called on Musharraf, who is both president and army chief, to completely give up power. In the past, she has called on him to renounce his military role while serving as president.
Bhutto, who is under house arrest in Lahore, said while she has tried to work with Musharraf on a "roadmap to democracy," the arrests of thousands of people on Monday convinced her he must go. "There's a total trust deficit," Bhutto said, adding that she has been placed under house arrest for seven days.

In her CNN interview, she also addressed media reports that Musharraf may have her deported. "I'm told by Sky television that the regime is getting a C-130 military aircraft ready to take me away, presumably to my home in Karachi. But I have not been given any indication of whether I will be taken out of this house arrest, or whether I will be taken to my own house, or to any unknown destination," Bhutto said.

"So I'm totally in the dark at this moment on what this regime is planning to do with me." Asked if she would leave the country if the government tries to force her out, Bhutto replied, "No, I won't go. Pakistan is my country. I belong in Pakistan and I can not be banished. I would prefer to live in a Pakistani jail than to be forced to leave."

While authorities barricaded the streets surrounding the house where she is staying, only a "handful" of officials and members of Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party (PPP) had tried to breach the cordon, CNN's Karl Penhaul reported.

"These party officials show up to the barricades. They symbolically chant two or three slogans and then almost voluntarily they seem to be stepping into police vans to be taken off for some kind of arrest," Penhaul reported.

"But certainly, there ... is no massing of party interests here and certainly, right now, there are many more police and, indeed, many more TV cameras than there are supporters of Benazir Bhutto."

Opposition groups had hoped to stage a five-day Lahore-to-Islamabad march and were counting on a groundswell of popular support to carry out the protest, but there appeared to be none.

Police and opposition officials reported the scattered burning of tires in Lahore to protest the barricades. Meanwhile, several hundred police officers surrounded the house where Bhutto was staying and declared it a "subjail," sending jail staff to monitor the situation.

On Friday Bhutto was briefly confined to her villa compound in Islamabad in an effort to halt a massive opposition protest in Rawalpindi against Musharraf's November 3 declaration of emergency rule. He has called it necessary to crack down on Islamic terrorists massing strength in volatile tribal regions along the Afghan border. The opposition says the emergency order amounts to martial law and amounts to a power grab by Musharraf.

Pakistani authorities have shut down media outlets and jailed opposition leaders and lawyers who protested Musharraf's sacking of a number of Supreme Court justices, including Chief Justice Ikhtar Muhammed Chaudhry. Opposition leaders contend Musharraf's emergency order was issued to avoid what they said was the top court's impending decision, that would have nullified his recent election victory, on grounds he was ineligible.

Musharraf has said the newly-installed court judges "accept the election," and he repeated his vow to step down as military chief as soon as the court approves his third term.

On Sunday, Musharraf announced that a parliamentary vote would take place before January 9, adding that it could take place with the state of emergency still in effect. In fact, he said, the emergency order "will ensure absolutely fair and transparent elections."

In the wake of the emergency order and crackdown, Bhutto has said talks on a power-sharing deal with Musharraf have been shelved. Fellow opposition leaders have criticized her for considering such a deal.

The United States and Britain, among other nations, have cautiously urged Musharraf to rescind the emergency decree.

"The president thinks that we need to lift the emergency rule in order to have free and fair elections," White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said Monday. "But again, let me stress that the situation in Pakistan is evolving, and it's not easy to predict what's going to happen or what's going to be said. We continue to urge everyone to exercise restraint and non-violence as they work through this crisis.

Meanwhile, the Commonwealth -- a 53-nation alliance made up largely of former members of the British Empire -- declared that Musharraf's emergency decree was taken "outside the provisions of the Constitution." The group demanded that the Pakistani leader rescind the decree, step down as military chief, release those detained under the emergency decree, remove restrictions on the press and hold elections as called for in the constitution.

"If, after review of progress, Pakistan has failed to implement these necessary measures, we will suspend Pakistan from the councils of the Commonwealth," said Commonwealth Secretary-General Don McKinnon, anticipating the next November 22 meeting.

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Bhutto says Musharraf must step down
By Simon Gardner

LAHORE, Pakistan (Reuters) - Pakistani opposition leader Benazir Bhutto called on Tuesday for military leader Pervez Musharraf to step down as president, isolating him in the run-up to a general election.

Britain stepped up international pressure on Musharraf, who imposed emergency rule on November 3, backing a 10-day Commonwealth ultimatum for him to end the emergency and quit as army chief.

Bhutto has long called for Musharraf to step down as army chief and become a civilian president but it was the first time she had called for him to quit as president altogether. She also said she could never serve as prime minister under him.

"It is time for him to go. He must quit as president," Bhutto, who has for months held power-sharing negotiations with Musharraf, told Reuters in a telephone interview.

She was speaking from the city of Lahore where she was placed under house arrest hours before a planned protest against emergency rule.

Musharraf set off a storm of criticism when he imposed the emergency, suspended the constitution, sacked most judges, locked up lawyers, rounded up thousands of opposition and rights activists and curbed the media.
The crisis in nuclear-armed Pakistan has raised fears about its stability and its ability to focus on battling a growing Islamist militancy.

"CONTAMINATED"

"I will not serve as prime minister as long as Musharraf is president," Bhutto said. "Even if I wanted to work with him, I would not have the public support."

"Negotiations between us have broken down over the massive use of police force against women and children. There's no question now of getting this back on track because anyone who is associated with General Musharraf gets contaminated," she said.

"The men whose wives have been mistreated, the women who have seen their spouses thrashed and beaten up in front of their eyes don't want us to have anything to do with General Musharraf."

Bhutto said Musharraf appeared "out of his depth": "There's a huge crisis."

A spokesman for Musharraf, who took power in a 1999 coup, declined to comment.

Two-time prime minister Bhutto planned to lead a motorcade on a 270 km (170 mile) route from Lahore to Islamabad to demand that Musharraf quit as army chief, end emergency rule, reinstate the constitution and free detained activists -- including the 7,500 Bhutto said were from her party.

Lahore is Pakistan's political nerve centre, the capital of Punjab province which is ruled by Musharraf supporters who are expected to suffer heavy losses in a general election the president has promised will be held before January 9.

But about 4,000 police moved in overnight around the Lahore house where Bhutto is staying, laying out coils of barbed wire, setting up barricades and blocking streets with trucks laden with sand. Police in riot vests and carrying batons manned barricades set up around a 1-km (half-mile) perimeter.

A detention order was pasted on the gate.

"Her residence is an official jail now," said a senior officer outside the house.

Police detained dozens of men and women chanting "Go Musharraf go" as they tried to pull down a barbed wire barricade. A Bhutto aide, Farzana Raja, was held after she tried to push her way past police to get to the house.

PRESSURE

Musharraf has come under growing pressure from Western allies to set Pakistan back on the path to democracy. He has declined to say when the constitution would be restored and said the emergency would ensure a fair vote.
Bhutto, dogged by accusations of corruption during her rule, said her party, Pakistan's biggest, might boycott the polls: "We haven't taken a final decision but that is the inclination.

U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and U.S. President George W. Bush both urged Musharraf on Monday to lift the emergency.

The Commonwealth gave him until November 22 to end emergency rule, restore the constitution and quit the army or face suspension.

British Foreign Secretary David Miliband, asked if the British government backed that call, said: "Absolutely, the Commonwealth position was one that the UK played an important part in creating."

Musharraf has justified the emergency by saying a meddling judiciary was hampering the battle against militants.
Diplomats say his main objective was to stop the Supreme Court from ruling invalid his October 6 re-election by legislative assemblies dominated by his supporters.

Musharraf has said he would step down as army chief and be sworn in as a civilian president as soon as the Supreme Court, where new judges seen as friendly to the government have been appointed, ruled on challenges to his election.

(Additional reporting by Kate Kelland in London; Writing by Robert Birsel; Editing by Rosalind Russell)

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A bureaucratic labyrinth
By TARIQ MALIK

While political parties arc questioning the code of conduct of Election Commission of Pakistan, the President and the current administration in conducting free and fair election here comes Election Commission of Pakistan announcing the draft Code of Conduct for political parties for the upcoming elections, without any pre-consultation with true stakeholders - the political parties. Why it was not discussed with political parties before and why just eight days were given to respond to it is simply incomprehensible.

In all democracies the shared code of ethical conduct sets out the guiding principles and practices that establish the framework for ethical conduct expected of not only political parties but all participants in the political process. If the Army is part of the political dispensation with its chief being the president, do we need their role be defined in code of ethics document? Does Election Commission of Pakistan have a spine to induce at the very least their oath as soldiers in the text of the document?

The shared code of ethical conduct is usually based upon a deep and enduring respect for the democratic process and compliance with election laws that codify the rules for elections and campaigning. Let's give the credit where its due: the most comprehensive election laws including the guidelines for the framework of code of ethics was prepared anti approved by the parliament by Zulfiqar Al Bhutto's democratic administration. This comprehensive document is known as representation of the People Act 19th. This document is supposed to be the guiding principle for all the elections of Pakistan. The current administration of Election Commission of Pakistan uses the same Act hut picks and chooses what suits current administration of Election Commission of conduct released by ECP for 2002 elections had 22 points but the latest draft release has 17 more. A comparative analysis will reveal the gems inserted so that violation or disqualifications should be easy subject to interpretation of ECP.

Consider few interesting items. "Parties and politicians shall refrain from making references to secret and confidential matters, which were within their official knowledge when they were in power." I have read the code of conduct documents of about dozens of countries, but this one beats all. What secret and confidential matters we are talking about? How does one define what is secret and confidential? Similarly, Item 9 under general conduct says "political parties and contesting candidates shall not refrain from making such comments on international issues as are likely to embarrass the government's relations with other countries, nor shall they say anything or do any act in any manner, which might prejudice Pakistan's foreign relations. Controversial or harsh remarks about leaders of other countries and their ideologies shall he avoided." ECP is so naïve that it does not understand that the nucleus of any election campaign is the criticism of foreign policies of the regime. How can an election campaign run without dissecting the success and failure of this regime's 'war of terrorism' specific foreign policy?

Nevertheless, there are some good points in code of ethics, though mostly taken out from Representation of the People Act 1976, but again the most important question is how to enforce those in absence of implementation mechanisms. For example, item 17 prohibits Ministers to combine their official visits with election campaign and item 18 prohibits the political parties and contesting candidates to procure support or assistance of any civil servant to promote or hinder the election of candidate. President, Prime Minister and Federal and State Ministers' visits organized by DCOs and district governments are clear-cut violation of this code. Just the other day, the Prime Minister accompanied by the ruling party chief and a flock of Ministers and other government officials went to Pir Pagara' house to cob a political arrangement with PML (Pagara group) and MQM. Similarly, daily barrage of electronic and print media ads by Government of Punjab with super-imposing chief minister's snapshots, paid by taxpayers money also defy the code of ethics. Once the final code of ethics is issued and the prevailing practices of the current regime still do not die down, how will ECP enforce it? Historical facts paint a dismal picture of past performance of ECP in conducting impartial, free and fair general elections. The soul of Pakistan has still scars of our notorious intelligence agencies putting together what was bhan mati ki kunba - the infamous Islami Jamhoori Ittehad (IJT) using public money. Why ECP remains silent then, and how it mitigates the same risk in forth coming general elections still remains to be seen!

While debate still rages on the demand of political parties to at least suspend, if not dismiss district governments, ECP should have included a code of conduct for the district governments as well. It talks about politicians contesting elections, ministers in executive administration and government bureaucrats buy does not touch upon the role of district governments. General elections 2008 has a great potential to be influenced by district governments thereby indicating the need to develop a code of conduct for the district governments.

In order to restore democratic order in Pakistan and to promote free, fair and credible elections, it is crucial that equality of access to political opportunities for all political parties be guaranteed by providing a level-playing field. An in-depth analysis of the code of restrictions, a more of bureaucratic labyrinth, an incomplete document which is silent on the enforcement mechanism and penalties.

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"STEVE GILL SHOW" INTERVIEW WITH SECRETARY OF STATE CONDOLEEZZA RICE

Q Joining us on our newsmakers live, a very special guest who's been with us on the Steve Gill Show before. Last time she came it was a lot more controversial. She was speaking at Vanderbilt University. We even had to dispense those "Tennesseans Love Condi" t- shirts just to help show her a welcoming approach in Tennessee. And normally, we don't restrict what questions we ask or issues we get into with a guest, but we've reached a deal with Secretary Rice that I'm not going to bring up the Tennessee -- or she's not going to bring up the Tennessee-Alabama football game if I don't bring up that Mississippi State-Alabama game Saturday. So a deal's a deal.
Secretary, good to have you back with us.
SEC. RICE: It's good to be with you, and that's a very good deal, Steve. Thank you. (Laughter.)

Q You are a -- I mean, a lot of folks know, I think, but probably don't recognize how much of a devoted college and pro football fan you actually are.
SEC. RICE: I am indeed. It's been a little rough -- some good points, not so good points.

Q Hey, that's SEC football. You've got ups and downs.
SEC. RICE: Ups and downs. Lots of good teams in the SEC these days.

Q You got a promotion since we last talked with you as National Security Advisor. Sometimes, be careful what you ask for because you've got a full plate. Just this morning, you've got Ms. Bhutto in Pakistan saying, apparently, she wants Musharraf, the President of Pakistan, to step aside as both president and military commander. Does this make your job harder or easier in finding a way out of the turmoil in Pakistan?
SEC. RICE: Well, it's clearly a difficult situation in Pakistan. And Steve, we're just focusing on a few basics. The first is that they need to end the state of emergency as soon as possible. Secondly, they're going to need to hold these elections in January. It was a good thing that President Musharraf said that, but they need to hold those elections. And we still think that there is room for moderate forces to work together because they all have a common enemy in the extremists who tried to kill President Musharraf, also who tried to kill Mrs. Bhutto. But the most important thing is to get out of this state of emergency so that something like normal life can return to Pakistan.

Q Mrs. Bhutto is hinting that she may even push a boycott of those elections if they take place in January. Obviously, that would be a disaster for democracy in Pakistan.
SEC. RICE: Well, we are concerned that when the elections take place they have to take place in a different atmosphere than now. You can't have free and fair elections with the kinds of restrictions on the media that you have, with the kinds of restrictions on assembly of opposition. So clearly, some things are going to have to change on the ground before those elections can be held in any state.

Q Southwest Asia occupying a lot of your attention. You've also got President Ahmadi-Nejad in Iran continuing to be very forceful and refusing to go along with inspections or backing off of their nuclear ambitions. Are we making any progress behind the scenes? There's a sense, it seems, that in Iran some of his support is starting to fall away. Can we take advantage of that and maybe force an internal regime change?

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Digging a Hole
By Editorial Desk; SECTA

With five words in an interview with reporters for The Times yesterday, Gen. Pervez Musharraf showed how far removed he is from understanding what democracy is, never mind fulfilling his oft-broken promise to lead Pakistan back toward a stable and prosperous future.

Asked about Benazir Bhutto's call for his resignation, General Musharraf, Pakistan's president, shot back that the opposition leader, who is under house arrest, ''has no right to ask.'' Oh, really?

Although General Musharraf seems to believe that he can continue calling the shots, his political space is narrowing. Ms. Bhutto has ruled out a power-sharing deal with him in a future government. Washington had hoped such an agreement would be the key to Pakistan's transition back to democracy. And is there anyone who assigns any credence to his claims that he declared martial law to assure free and fair elections?

The world knows what it would look like if the general were serious about giving up a dictator's power. He would resign as the army's chief of staff by tomorrow, the day he is supposed to be sworn in for another term as president. He would reinstate the Supreme Court justices that he dismissed so they could not declare his ''re-election'' to be the sham that it so evidently was -- rather than have it validated by pliant justices he installed after declaring martial law.

In the interview, General Musharraf continued to defy Pakistan's Constitution -- and direct appeals by President George W. Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice -- by refusing to say when he would step down as army leader. He offered a ludicrous defense of his scrapping the Constitution, dismissing the Supreme Court and arresting some 2,500 opposition party workers, lawyers and human rights advocates -- and gave no hint when he might lift martial law.

Although he proved his tough-guy bona fides by rising to the top army post and then staging a bloodless coup in 1999, General Musharraf looks increasingly weak. He has taken to petty name-calling against the head of Pakistan's human rights commission. Putting political rivals under house arrest makes it seem as if he fears them as much, if not more, than Al Qaeda and the Taliban, which are the real threats to his country and beyond.

Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte is scheduled to meet General Musharraf in Islamabad later this week. We hope his message will be unambiguous. General Musharraf must lift martial law, reinstate constitutional processes, release political detainees, unfetter the media, give up his army post and accept whatever ruling the Supreme Court makes on his eligibility to be president. He must set a firm date for elections in January and facilitate everything -- an election commission, voter registration, media access, international monitors -- to make those polls as free and fair as possible.

Otherwise, the United States, which has provided Pakistan with more than $10 billion since Sept. 11, 2001, should condition some of that assistance on Islamabad's performance in fighting extremists and reconsider aid not directly linked to counterterrorism, like support for the F-16s that Washington let Pakistan buy. It should also shift money toward political parties, schools and courts to help the Pakistani people build a democracy.

The United States has core interests in Pakistan that need to be defended. That means standing firm for a stable civil society and democratic processes, fighting terrorism and securing the nation's nuclear arsenal.

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Musharraf Makeover Proves Too Much for One Lobby Firm
By Jeffrey H. Birnbaum

Lobbying can be an unsavory business. Just ask former senator John Edwards of North Carolina. He hopes to ride that fact to the Democratic nomination for president.

Then again, lobbyists love it when companies and countries get into trouble. The bigger the problem, the larger their fees.

So it was noteworthy last week that Cassidy & Associates, one of D.C.'s biggest lobbying firms, resigned from its just-signed $1.2 million-a-year lobbying contract with the government of Pakistan.

Cassidy dropped the engagement, it said, because the military crackdown by Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf had rendered its efforts to generate good will useless. "We thought it best to withdraw from the account as the dramatic changes in Pakistan impeded our effectiveness on their behalf," said Tom Alexander, Cassidy's spokesman.

A statement by the Pakistani Embassy, however, raises the prospect that the decision was more mutual. "The contract for one year was still at the trial phase when, during the course of the first month of association, both the Embassy of Pakistan and Cassidy & Associates came to the conclusion that the latter could not effectively implement the contract as lobbyist," an embassy spokesman said in a statement. "As a result, Cassidy & Associates asked for withdrawal from the contract that the Embassy has accepted."

Cassidy says it was not pushed out by Pakistan. "There was never any concern about our work expressed by the embassy," Alexander said.

Whatever the story is, there's no need to worry about Pakistan (not that you would). It still has a lobbyist, the same one it has had for 2 1/2 years. Van Scoyoc Associates continues to represent the government at half the price Cassidy was charging -- $660,000 a year. "We work with the embassy to address legitimate concerns that have been raised in Congress and recent actions by the government of Pakistan," said Mark Tavlarides, a vice president of the lobbying firm.

And clearly, with no regrets

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Japan Reconsiders Pakistan Aid After Benazir Bhutto Is Detained
By Sachiko Sakamaki

Nov. 13 (Bloomberg) -- Japan may not increase aid to Pakistan as planned after opposition leader Benazir Bhutto was detained to prevent her from attending a demonstration against the suspension of the country's constitution.
Japan's government intended to boost aid to Pakistan, Foreign Minister Masahiko Komura said today. The government is ``very concerned'' after President Pervez Musharraf imposed emergency rule and put Bhutto under house arrest, he said.

``We must stop and think about the large increase of aid we were planning,'' Komura said at a regular press conference in Tokyo. ``There are various possibilities,'' he said, when asked whether Japan will cut aid.

Japan provided 30.8 billion yen ($280 million) in aid, including loans at below-market rates, to Pakistan in the year to March 2007, according to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Komura didn't specify the amount of the increase.
The extra assistance was supposed to help compensate for the suspension of a naval refueling mission in the Indian Ocean in support of the U.S.-led war in Afghanistan, the Sankei newspaper reported on Nov. 1.

Japan's navy provided fuel and water to ships from 11 countries, including Pakistan, from 2001 until this month, when the law backing the mission expired. The opposition Democratic Party of Japan, which controls the country's upper house of parliament, is opposed to extending the mission.
To contact the reporter on this story: Sachiko Sakamaki in Tokyo at ssakamaki1@bloomberg.net .

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Diplomatic game plan to settle Pakistan crisis
By Paul Reynolds World affairs correspondent BBC News website

By announcing that elections will be held by 9 January, Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf is fulfilling one of the demands made on him by the United States and Britain - but not all of them.

A diplomatic game plan is unfolding under which General Musharraf is coming under pressure to unwind the decisions he has taken. The hope is that this will enable Pakistan to emerge into a more democratic future.

All political guns are being brought up - from the big one of a phone call from President Bush to the Pakistani leader to smaller ones like the threat of suspending Pakistan from the Commonwealth (again). Commonwealth heads of government meet in Uganda next week.

The plan

The key elements of the plan are: the validation by a new Supreme Court of President's Musharraf's election as president, Musharraf's resignation as head of the army (thereby separating the posts of army chief and head of state), the release of political prisoners, the restoration of media freedoms and the lifting of the state of emergency, all of this leading to the elections in January.
The implicit bargain that Washington and London have offered General Musharraf is that they will support him but in a reduced role and only in a constitutional framework.

There is a mutuality of interest here. The US and UK believe that the general is essential to their purposes of containing the Taleban insurgency in Afghanistan and clamping down on the Islamic radicals in Pakistan itself. However, President Musharraf is not regarded as an effective enough figure on his own and not credible without a democratic framework.

The implicit bargain that Washington and London have offered General Musharraf is that they will support him but only in a reduced role and only in a constitutional framework.

That was why the British and Americans supported the return of the opposition leader and former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto and that is why they are working so hard to stitch the whole thing together.

It is possible, some diplomats believe, that this is what the general had in mind all along. His mistake, they think, was not to announce a timetable immediately. That might have defused some of the opposition. The British and American policy therefore has been to get him to be clear on a timetable and stick to it.

One interesting feature is how relaxed Washington and London seem to be about the fate of the removed Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry, who remains under house arrest. It seems that they would accept new judges, who, according to the game plan, would give legitimacy to the election by the parliament of General Musharraf as president.

Benazir Bhutto is now having to distance herself from the general, though few diplomats doubt that she would negotiate if and when the moment came. In the meantime she has to build up her street credibility while not provoking an even harsher clampdown, even a military coup which could come if there is chaos. Coups have come before in Pakistani history.

Nuclear weapons

One aspect of the crisis that has caused concern in Washington is the prospect of a "Talebanised" government in Pakistan with its finger on Pakistan's nuclear weapons.

There is less worry about this among British diplomats, who seem confident that Pakistan's military would retain control, whoever ran the government.

As for aid, it is unlikely that British assistance (£480m for the next three years) will be cut significantly, since this is largely aimed at poverty and counterterrorism. Some aid not designed for these purposes might be reviewed if the situation gets worse (eg a military takeover).
Paul.Reynolds-INTERNET@bbc.co.uk

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U.S. to Send Special Envoy to Confront Musharraf
By HELENE COOPER

WASHINGTON, Nov. 12 — The Bush administration is dispatching a high-level envoy to Pakistan to tell the Pakistani president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, face to face that the United States will not be satisfied with his plan to hold elections unless he first lifts emergency law, administration officials said Monday.

While welcoming the news that General Musharraf would hold elections in January rather than delay them, they questioned whether elections could be legitimate if held when the country remains effectively under martial law, with opposition parties in lockdown and unable to campaign or assemble freely.

“The president thinks we need to lift the emergency rule in order to have free and fair elections,” said Dana Perino, the White House spokeswoman. A senior administration official said that it remained an open question whether free elections could be held that reflected the true wishes of the Pakistani people if General Musharraf continued to jail or otherwise detain the opposition.

The comments reflected increased frustration within the administration over General Musharraf’s power grab, as well as mounting uneasiness about how much longer Pakistan can continue in the present chaos before descending into further instability. The plan to send an envoy to Pakistan was described by administration officials who declined to elaborate further about the mission.

Publicly, Bush administration officials say that they continue to support General Musharraf, who is still viewed by the Pentagon as America’s best option for tackling operatives of Al Qaeda in Pakistan’s frontier provinces. “Nobody is ready to cut him off at the knees yet,” one official said.

But the official, who requested anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly on the issue, said that many people within the administration were worried that General Musharraf’s missteps would soon so erode his base at home that he could be forced to give up power.

To prepare for that possibility, the Bush administration has been taking care in recent days to try to distinguish between its support for Pakistan and its support for the general.

When Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, for example, told the ABC News program “This Week” that “we’ve been in close contact, as you might imagine, through our embassy, through our ambassador there, with all parties in Pakistan,” she was signaling that the United States was hedging its bets in Pakistan by reaching out to civilian institutions and nongovernmental organizations, administration officials said. “This is not a personal matter about President Musharraf,” Ms. Rice said. “This is about the Pakistani people. And the United States has been dedicated to helping the Pakistani people come to a more democratic path.”

Further complicating the issue for the Bush administration so far has been the continuing political tug of war between General Musharraf and the opposition leader Benazir Bhutto: Ms. Bhutto keeps announcing rallies to oppose the general’s emergency rule, and he keeps putting her under house arrest for what he says is her own safety.

The Pakistani authorities issued a seven-day detention order against Ms. Bhutto on Monday in a bid to stop her from leading another planned protest march this week from the eastern city of Lahore to the capital, Islamabad.

General Musharraf’s deputies said they had received intelligence suggesting that Ms. Bhutto could be a target for militants. While American officials say they, too, have been worried about Ms. Bhutto’s safety, one official said the detention order fits neatly with the general’s emergency powers decree.

“He wasn’t exactly running to put her under house arrest when she first arrived,” the official said, alluding to the suicide attack on Ms. Bhutto’s convoy after her arrival in Karachi last month.
Steven Lee Myers contributed reporting.

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Opaque, Muddy Waters
By Ayesha Siddiqa

The emergency insulates the Pak army—only the militancy will gain from it

In his speech on November 3 soon after imposing Emergency, General-President Pervez Musharraf thought it fit and useful to hint at links between judicial activism and the growing extremism in the country. He suggested that the judicial decision to free some terrorists had provoked him to impose Emergency. Does this mean that the military is now in a better position to fight extremists? With a compliant judiciary in place, will this naturally bolster the army's capacity to fight insurgencies?

Seemingly, Musharraf's main gripe with the judiciary was that it had given relief to terrorists, particularly those behind the Red Mosque crisis, and had set free about 61 terrorists. He didn't mention that he had not bothered to sack his federal minister, Ejaz-ul-Haq, who had once confessed to bailing out one of the Red Mosque mullahs charged by the anti-terrorist court.

What the judiciary did was to merely offer an alternative source of justice to the common people who were not heard by the executive. Even Dr A.Q. Khan, the nuclear guru, it was rumoured, had planned to appeal to the Supreme Court. Perhaps, this would have brought out the real story underlying nuclear proliferation.

The fact is that people have no clarity about the government's stand (and role) on several issues. For instance, extremists such as Maulana Fazlullah and his father-in-law Sufi Muhammad in Swat were a creation of the intelligence agencies and the war in Afghanistan. Fazlullah's radio channel continues to spew venom despite the government controlling all frequencies. So, how could the judiciary be blamed for the ineptness of the military-bureaucracy?

And will the soldiers now fight better against the terrorists? A day after the Emergency, the government announced that 213 soldiers who had surrendered to the forces of a Waziristan tribal chief, Baitullah Mehsud, had been released in exchange for 25 terrorists. Military spokesman Maj Gen Waheed Arshad claimed the army had released the terrorists selectively, but can anyone pick and choose once negotiations are begun with extremists? The new media laws will only aid in hiding the latest figures on surrenders/defections.

The problems of low morale are not peculiar to Pakistan. Counter-insurgency operations have their own dynamics, especially when it's being conducted by people with connections to the enemy. India's operations in its state of Punjab, for example, were fraught with similar problems. In Pakistan, the paramilitary Frontier Constabulary is drawn largely from Waziristan or Balochistan, the areas wracked by terrorism. There have even been incidents of soldiers refusing to fight their own people. Although stories of army defections are less known, the fact is the counter-insurgency battle in Waziristan is proving tough for the army, especially when the country at large is not sure whose war is being fought. The war on terror appears more America's war than Pakistan's. And the government itself is to be blamed for this. There are times when the forces have had to own up to operations conducted by the US army from across the border. A popular perception is that Emergency was imposed at the behest of the Americans to fight terrorism. The sacking of independent—and questioning—judges would certainly make life easier if the intent is to please the US.

The predominantly Punjabi military also has over 25 per cent Pashtun personnel. This adds to the problem of conducting counter-insurgency operations in the NWFP. There is also the issue of ideology—senior generals have talked about the influence of Islamic extremism on the officer cadre; but on other occasions they describe the military as the only secular institution in the country. It's true that not all of the military has been 'influenced', but the prolonged interaction with the Taliban is bound to have had an ideological impact on some, especially those in the intelligence agencies.

The ideology factor makes the war in Waziristan far more difficult than the one in Balochistan, where the army is entrenched against Baloch nationalists who, it is claimed, are funded by India. In any case, ethnicity is less of a problem here because there are fewer Baloch in the armed forces. The issue here is the treacherous terrain. The Baloch nationalists claim they face tougher times than the Taliban in the area because the latter have links with the government. Maulana Fazlur Rehman of the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal has had close links with the Taliban from the 1980s.

There is a tremendous lack of clarity regarding the ground situation and the military's strategic position on militancy. Under the circumstances, the only change that Emergency will bring is to insulate the government's confused policies from public scrutiny and expose the state and society to greater threat. The weakening of Pakistan's judiciary can only bolster extremism, it will certainly not contain it

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Bankrupt relationship

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Benazir Bhutto tests Pervez Musharraf’s strength
By Christina Lamb and Dean Nelson in Islamabad

BENAZIR BHUTTO last night demanded that General Pervez Musharraf step down and insisted that any hope of an understanding with him was now “finished”.
“By suspending the constitution and declaring a state of emergency he reneged on his promises to us,” Pakistan’s former prime minister declared. “Any understanding between us is now finished.”
In a late night telephone interview with The Sunday Times, Bhutto sounded tired but elated after what she described as “another long day”. She spoke of her outrage at Musharraf’s acts of the past week that have plunged the country into crisis.
“I feel absolutely shocked that we have these year-long negotiations and we agree to work together, then he turns around and suspends the constitution,” she said. “I have to wonder if he was ever serious.
“It wasn’t as if he had no alternative. Why did he do this when he could have carried on with the road map toward democracy agreed with the country’s biggest political party?”
His actions, Bhutto said, had forced her to call people out into the streets, something she had been eager to avoid for fear of bloodshed. It was to prevent this, she said, that she had agreed the deal which saw him dropping corruption charges against her, enabling her to return home last month after 8Å years in exile.
“Now he’s left us no choice but to call out the people,” she said. “I face a difficult predicament. I’ve long been worried about creeping Talibanisation in Pakistan and if I don’t take the lead then there may well be extremist elements that take advantage. So I have no choice.”
Bhutto insisted that the only way to avoid violence is for Musharraf to step down. “He’s put himself into a corner and it’s of his own making,” she said.
“His two trump cards were the international community and the army. Now he’s losing both. The only option he has is to step aside and hand power to an interim government of national consensus that will oversee elections. His time is up.”
On Friday, under international pressure, Musharraf announced that he would hold elections by February 15. Yesterday Malik Mohammed Qayyum, the attorney-general, told reporters that the state of emergency would “end within one month”. But Bhutto dismissed these assurances. “It would be impossible to have elections in these circumstances where both the courts and the election commission are in his control,” she said.
Musharraf's declaration of what amounted to martial law, arresting thousands, locking up judges and taking television stations off the air, has seen Bhutto transformed from someone doing a deal with a dictator into a woman — and mother — prepared to sacrifice everything for democracy.
She vowed to go ahead with the three-day Long March planned for this week from Lahore to Islamabad, despite further warnings of assassination attempts such as the suicide bombs that killed 140 people during her return to Karachi three weeks ago. The march will bring her into all-out confrontation with the regime.
“I know there are risks for my personal safety but I have to look at the bigger picture,” she said.
“Pakistan is facing the threat of disintegration. One by one the tribal areas have fallen to [the] Taliban and now they are advancing further into the northwest frontier. With an unrepresentative government and an army that is leaderless and rudderless, Pakistan is facing its most serious threat since 1971 [when the country split into two].”
However, the government insisted that the march would be blocked. “All marches, processions and political gatherings are banned at the moment, so I’m afraid the march has been outlawed,” said Tariq Azim, the information minister who was once an ally of Bhutto.
“We are committed to upholding the law and it must be applied equally for everyone, including Benazir Bhutto.”
Bhutto said she would not be deterred. “Even if they block it, it’s like a strike call because it paralyses the whole area. Either way they lose and we win. If they don’t interrupt it we show the numbers we can get out. If they do bring out all those police and teargassing, it still brings everything to a standstill and shows the numbers we would have had.”
Bhutto was speaking from her home in Islamabad after spending the day building up pressure on Musharraf with a series of high-profile visits around the Pakistani capital, constantly trailed by the microphones and lenses of the international media.
First she met non-governmental organisations and local journalists banned from reporting current events and protesting against new laws which impose jail sentences on anyone who criticises Musharraf. She also kept up international pressure on the government by holding a meeting with diplomats last night.
For the most part Bhutto seemed able to move unimpeded. The freedom of movement she is enjoying, while authorities admit that they have arrested more than 3,000 people, had prompted speculation that she might still be in negotiations with Musharraf.
However, Bhutto insisted that there is no contact between the two sides and that it is because of her high international profile that Musharraf has not arrested her. “The international interest in Pakistan is giving me more security, although at the same time it’s made me a bigger target for assassins,” she said.
It is increasingly hard to see a way out for Musharraf. Bhutto’s call for millions to join the march has alarmed senior military officers. It is widely believed that General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, Musharraf's deputy chief of army staff, is unhappy about the emergency. He is being touted as the man to topple Musharraf and hand the government back to civilian politicians.
“Musharraf is making one bad decision after another,” said Bhutto. “First there were the peace agreements with the Taliban in the tribal areas, then the dismissal of the chief justice . . . now all this is coming home to roost. The only answer is for him to move aside.”
The last time Bhutto announced a Long March — in 1993, against the government of Nawaz Sharif and Ghulam Ishaq Khan, then president — she never needed to take a step. The night before the march, Khan resigned and called elections.
“That would be nice,” she said last night.

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MARTIAL LAW REDUX
By Sherry Rehman

Before the imposition of martial law on November 3rd 2007, Pakistan was struggling with two critical challenges to its political stability. One was the subversion of civilian, representative rule, an issue the nation-state had confronted since 1958, when the first martial law was imposed on Pakistan. The other challenge had roots in a more recent, but far more bloody vintage of the 1980s. Militancy that exploits religion, which incubated with General Ziaul Haq's security apparatus and state ideology, has grown into a full-scale terrorist insurgency today. Major portions of the Tribal Areas, many parts of the NWFP, some territory in the Northern Areas, and now two-thirds of Swat, have ceded ground to non-state actors, both foreign and local.      

Today the country is back in the quagmire of both dictatorship and terrorism. General Musharraf has once again called a martial law an Emergency, as he did in 1999. An Emergency suspends fundamental human rights, but falls short as an instrument that can send the judiciary packing. Judges cannot be made to swear fresh oaths of allegiance, and therefore may not provide the judgements required to prop unconstitutional measures. An Emergency does not require a PCO for its imposition. A PCO, or Provisional Constitutional Order, entails a suspension of the Constitution of the state, substituting it with a martial law, which can only be imposed by a Chief of Army Staff. Under a Martial Law, there is no source of justice other than PCO Courts, and dictators are provided a veneer of legal cover. So let's first call a spade a spade. Pakistan is under martial law today, not Emergency rule. The assemblies, whether constitutional until November 15th or under the PCO, are alive so that they can provide a democratic window-dressing.  

The PCO cabinet has already given its rubber stamp to the Emergency, and the military's surrogates in parliament have obediently pushed it through the National Assembly as well. All these acts are post-PCO and have no bearing on the facts on the ground that General Musharraf has already created. There is one man-rule in the country and that is propped only by the use of force. Which is why General Musharraf's announcement of a general election in February and his stepping down as army chief before that has been received with general scepticism. The reason why Pakistan is under Martial Law today is not so that terrorism can be contained, as the disingenuous Promulgation Order says. It is under Martial Law so that the possibility of an adverse judgment by the former benches of the newly independent superior judiciary on General Musharraf's eligibility to hold two offices could be avoided. Nothing more, nothing less.

 If terrorism was the issue, why are peaceful opponents of Martial Law and terrorism being detained and brutalised all over the country? If terrorism was the objective, why are Asma Jehangir, Aitzaz Ahsan, I A Rehman, Iqbal Haider and hundreds of lawyers like PPP's Ahsan Bhoon, and civil society activists in jail? Why have independent judges been put under house arrest? Those who gave relief to Lal Masjid in any case are on the benches today. If terrorism was the objective why are wanted criminals allowed to hold press conferences openly threatening the life of Ms Benazir Bhutto for her anti-terrorism clarity? If terrorism was the objective, why have 25 terrorists been released after the imposition of Martial law? If terrorism was the objective why is a peaceful tourist backwater like Swat over-run by foreign and Pakistani militants? Is the state only able to establish its writ now through a law of the jungle? If terrorism is the objective, why has the investigation on the massacre of October 19th in Karachi not been treated as an urgent priority? Why was evidence hastily cleaned up, and why is a Pakistan-led independent police inquiry not being assisted by Scotland Yard or the FBI as many enquiries have been in the past?    If terrorism is the objective why is the death of 160 innocent people who were victims of terror being treated like a non-event? Do the culprits not need to be nabbed? If terrorism was the objective why has the independent media been blacked out? Why have cable networks been jammed and why have satellite alternatives been the object of crackdowns by the state? Why has the print media been given press advice, and why is a new "code of conduct" being formulated by the regime to gag the press? Why has Pakistan been thrust back into the dark days of the 1980s, when political leaders were either killed, tortured, arrested or driven underground?     

 Clearly, none of the actions described have anything to do with curbing terrorism. In fact, quite to the contrary, history has taught us that Pakistan has only drifted towards crises during military clampdowns. Extremism and polarisation flourishes when democracy is under lockdown. But structural and fundamental disconnects are not the only problem in such a scenario. When the sixth largest standing army in the world busies itself with manipulative politics though coups and double-coups, it begins to lose focus. Not only is it unable to function as the crack professional outfit it is reputed to be, it loses ground in the public eye as an institution that rules the nation instead of serving it. The pseudo-Jihadist officials who served Zia's fundamentalist agenda by creating an anti-PPP political alliance in the shape of the IJI by funnelling state money into slush funds and diverted Afghan resistance petro-dollars into powerful non-state proxies are back in action today. They subverted the aims of a professional army and democratic politicians by using intelligence resources to serve their own covert agenda then, and are trying to do the same again today with the same line-up of reactionary political proxies.

The opposition is gearing up to challenge this reversal from a transition to democracy. The PPP was the only party that sees a peaceful transition to democracy as a priority. Its negotiations with the regime were for movement towards democracy, not to prop a dictatorship. The PPP Chairperson's return to Pakistan from Dubai was a brave step to lead the nation and the party in this moment of crisis. Her call to take the protest to the streets came after months of attempts to avoid more bloodshed, as Pakistan can ill afford more instability. The PPP has been consistent in its position in calling for a restoration of the Constitution, the stepping down of General Musharraf as Army Chief, respect for the judiciary, a free and fair election on schedule, under a reconstituted Election Commission, and the removal of the curbs on the media as the only route to democracy.

Slapping a ban on the PPP's Rawalpindi jalsa will only roil the streets further, as will any bid to immobilise Ms Bhutto by house arrest before the 13th Nov Long March from Lahore. The PPP showed its non-violent mass support on October 18th,, yet at the same time no one can doubt the party's ability or record to resist dictatorships, as it stands firm in the face of bullets and persecution. The message to democratic politicians is that we will once again have to fight with our lives, on the streets, for the right to elect our own leadership and for the rule of law to return to Pakistan. Democracy and its attendant institutions have never been given a chance to  take root, and now this is a fight for the survival of Pakistan. The military regime is no longer at a place where it can guarantee peace, stability and governance to the people of Pakistan alone, and for the first time, the whole world can see that this is true.

Sherry Rehman is the Central Information Secretary of the PPP.

Information Secretary
Pakistan Peoples Party
49 Old Clifton, Karachi
021 5834663/4
21, St 37, F 7/1, Islamabad
051 9224129
Pakistan
" La Ikraha Fid Deen"
{There is No Compulsion in Religion]
The Quran

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The Real Musharraf
ByAsma Jahangir

LAHORE, Pakistan -- It was close to midnight last Saturday when Gen. Pervez Musharraf finally appeared on state-run television. That's when police vans surrounded my house. I was warned not to leave, and hours later I learned I would be detained for 90 days.

At least I have the luxury of staying at home, though I cannot see anyone. But I can only watch, helpless, as this horror unfolds.

The Musharraf government has declared martial law to settle scores with lawyers and judges. Hundreds of innocent Pakistanis have been rounded up. Human rights activists, including women and senior citizens, have been beaten by police. Judges have been arrested and lawyers battered in their offices and the streets.

These citizens are our true assets: young, progressive and full of spirit. Many of them were trained to uphold the rule of law. They are being brutalized for seeking justice.

Musharraf justified his draconian measures by saying he needed to be able to
use all his might to fight the terrorists infecting our country. Yet the day after he declared an emergency, the Dawn newspaper reported that scores of terrorists were released by the government. While tyranny was being unleashed on peaceful citizens, the notorious militant Fazalullah (also known as Maulana Radio) had seized the beautiful town of Madyan, according to the Daily Times, and hoisted his "Islamic" flag over buildings while the security forces surrendered.

Musharraf has implied that militancy increased in Pakistan because of judicial interference in governance. But until this past March, the judiciary had yielded to all executive demands. Five years ago, the general dismissed the then-chief justice and his colleagues, charging that they were obstructing his process of democratization. What is democratic about a judiciary that's not independent?

In recent days police have raided the home of the president of the Supreme Court Bar Association -- his wife has gone into hiding -- and the law chambers of two former presidents of the bar. Their clerks have been harassed. Military intelligence officers are interrogating leading attorneys. Meanwhile, unknown lawyers are being elevated to the bench.

Since Saturday, police officers have barged into my house twice after receiving (false) warnings that I had escaped. On seeing me, they sheepishly admitted they were misled.

I have tried to make them understand the difference between people such as myself and terrorists. "If I did run away, how far would I go?" I asked them. "In any event, I am not likely to blow myself up around the corner."
One police officer said that he agreed but that his job was at greater risk if I got away than if a terrorist escaped the law. Terrorists, he pointed out, outnumber rights activists in our country.

The officer argued that lawyers and judges hamper law enforcement. "How can we bring law and order if we cannot torture criminals? We must be given a free hand to deal with terrorists, and the chief justice has no business to ask us to produce them in courts. We are itching to lay our hands on all those judges who humiliated us for carrying out our duties," he told me. When I asked how he knew who the terrorists were, he insisted that the intelligence was infallible.

Yet he didn't know I hadn't escaped from my house.

The international community is alarmed at Musharraf's actions, but Pakistanis expected this. The Bush administration had built up the general as moderate and benign, but the true face of this regime has been exposed.

A balanced picture of Pakistan had begun to emerge in recent weeks. Thousands turned out to greet Benazir Bhutto upon her return last month; Pakistanis were progressive-minded enough to elect a female political leader years ago. Hundreds of progressive-minded lawyers have rallied for democratic values. I welcome Bhutto's call for the Pakistan People's Party to join the demonstrations.

But Pakistan is threatened by Islamist militants, and our civil society suffers the worst of this creeping Talibanization. Woefully, the Musharraf regime is neither inclined to reverse this trend nor capable of doing so. No one has exact solutions, but there is virtual unanimity that Pakistan's political leadership must take charge and that the military must cooperate with an elected civilian government.

Musharraf's promises to hold elections by Feb. 15 or to resign from the army
are a red herring. He has pledged before to give up his uniform and failed to follow through. Any election held under these circumstances will not be free and will only put the crisis on hold. Furthermore, militarization will kill the spirit of the progressive forces while boosting the terrorists' morale.

A transition to democracy is crucial, but unless freedom of the press and the judiciary's independence are restored, any changes will remain toothless. It will be difficult to put Pakistan on the path to democracy, but we must begin now, before it is too late.
Asma Jahangir, a Pakistani lawyer under house arrest in Lahore, chairs the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan. She is a member of the international board of the Open Society Institute.

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Pakistan, Prince of Denmark
ByAli Eteraz

The uncritical support of Musharraf is a slowly unfolding tragedy. It shows the US has not learned the lessons from the Shah in Iran.

The only way to explain why the US and its allies do not abandon a leader who is less popular with his people than the terrorist whom he is being paid billions to hunt is that the people of Pakistan are considered irrelevant in discussions about Pakistan.  At about every 20-year interval, the west has given its blessings to the military in Pakistan to usurp the writ of state.  He, upon taking power, falls prostrate in our direction, vigorously rubbing our feet.

First, in the 1960s Pakistan was turned servile as a way to counter India's Marxist lean; then in the 1980s it was turned into our  mercenary to serve as a launching paid for our proxy war against the Soviets; and now with Musharraf, Pakistan is our maid, tasked with scraping human scum out of intractable mountains. With each dictator we have given a Machiavellian middle finger to the people of Pakistan - to their right of self-determination - and said to them that Uncle Sam, in conjugal relations with Mother Military, know best.

Yet, if we do know best, why do our tyrannical experiments consistently turn tragic?  Our first dictator helped tear Pakistan into two. Our next tyrant left behind a legacy of violent Islam and Wahhabi ideology so pernicious that it completely raped Pakistan's centuries-long reign of moderate song-and-saint religiosity.  The current tyrant, meanwhile, is not only less popular than Bin Laden, but he is completely inept in counteracting terrorism.  He has: failed to reform the madrassas; cultivated a Kangaroo Sharia court in his backyard for six months, which he could use for political benefit; killed those that kept the Taliban at bay; considered appeasing the militants by letting them implement Sharia; turned Pakistan into a state sponsor of terrorism; made alliances with pro-Taliban parties; and even engaged in what are being called crimes against humanity.  My editor at Jewcy reminded me that Musharraf is so frightening to terrorists that al-Qaida mastermind Khaled Sheikh Mohammad literally lived within 10 miles of him.  This is the man that John Negroponte at the State Department considers "indispensable."

Dictators are incapable of eliminating extremism.  A dictatorship is afflicted with the original sin of having seized power with violence, and therefore has no moral authority to speak against those who employ violence.  A dictatorship is bereft of the psychological calm that comes from being popularly elected and lives life like an anxious little demon, spraying bullets wildly, without aim or purpose.

Furthermore, a dictator that must pander to western democracies is caught in an Orwellian double-think, because he has no way of reconciling why he denies to his own people - the freedom that his allies and masters deem to be self-evident for their own populace - unless, of course, he values the lives of his own people less than the lives of his western allies.

The only thing a dictator can do to resolve this tension is to create the illusion of freedom.  A new subterranean world arises into which torture, disappearances and dirty hands, are swept.  The dictator, hiding his own failures in order to create the chimera of freedom, harps on the corruption of the previous leaders, which is not wrong factually, but wrong logically.  He does not realise that the only reason anyone is aware of the faults of predecessors at all is because they were not dictators.

There is an insanity in supporting Musharraf.  His western backers are Cornelius, pouring a poison called Musharraf into the ear of Pakistani civil society, creating the conditions for the Pakistani public turning into a deranged Hamlet, brooding menacingly in a dark South Asiancorridor,  slowly going mad, until one day he ushers in a carnival of blood and murder.

That murder, unless remedial steps are taken now, will be in the form of an Islamic revolution like the one in Iran.  Intelligent minds have already started to point out the "eerie similarity" between the state of Musharraf now; and the Shah in the 1970s.

In Iran a broad coalition of liberal democrats, lawyers, professionals, students, teachers, leftists and radicals, coalesced - slowly over the span of many years - in the figure of Khomeini.  If we continue to insist on backing Musharraf, the same will happen in Pakistan, and a Sunni Khomeini will rise from northern Pakistan.  Already, merely 18% of Pakistanis care to fight terrorists; and 49% of them approve of home-grown extremist groups, meaning that fierce radicals are becoming acceptable.  There are already people waxing romantic about those resisting Musharraf with guns. These opinions are Musharraf's fault. His ineptitude and mostly his illegitimacy.  If a revolutionary Iran-style coalition forms, the Pakistani military will neither be able to - nor willing to - stand up against it, because in the past every time a Pakistani leader has asked the military to crush street protests, the military has refused.  Thus, when this haphazard coalition does take to the streets and the military stands down, the bloodbath will begin, reminiscent of years 1979 to 1980 in Iran.  The Islamist maniacs will quickly slaughter all opposition, exile every secular person, and sit pretty, bordering the Iranian regime on one side, shovelling billions

into a Kashmiri insurgency against India, and backing the Taliban take over of Afghanistan.  The nukes are safe as long as they are in  military hands, but if the Islamists run the military, then the nukes will suddenly be referred to as The Islamic Bomb -- and no-one will be safe. Someone check out the range of the Ghauri III. This turn of events will not occur if Musharraf gives way to democracy right now.  It will occur, however, if Musharraf is allowed to remain in place.  The time for sanity to prevail is now.  Pakistanis consider free elections and an independent judiciary their number one priority.  One of their popular leaders - the only one not in jail -- has made a call for street protests.  If the other leaders were allowed out of their homes, they would mimic the call.  Yet, while being aware of this, Bush refuses to abandon Musharraf.

Bush did call Musharraf for 20 minutes yesterday.  However, to suggest to thinking people that this call is anything more than a cute PR stunt is downright insulting when, after talking to Bush, Musharraf went to the parliament and stated that he is not "under dictation" from the US and there is "no specific time frame for holding elections."  Not only that, but even if Musharraf moves forward with elections at this point, the military expert Aysha Siddiqa notes, they will be structurally organised to benefit his own party, the PML-Q.

Furthermore, without reinstatement of the independent Supreme Court  that Musharraf has so brazenly removed and replaced with a new one, any challenge to the legitimacy of the elections would not stand up anyway, meaning that Bush is giving a thumbs up to rigged elections.  Bush needs to do more than just to let Musharraf provide the definition of what constitutes free and fair.  Further, to really put some insecurity in Musharraf's belly, Bush and his officials should meet with Mullah Diesel, Benazir Bhutto, Nawaz Sharif, Imran Khan, and any other Pakistani opposition figure who wants to fly over.

The way things are right now, Bush and Condi's weakly wagging fingers are designed to give Musharraf the cover to carry on just as he is. After all, one of Pakistan's leading journalists, Hamid Mir, did say that according to his sources the US embassy gave Musharraf the green light for calling the emergency.  Such complicity suggests that Bush simply has no idea whether Musharraf's dictatorial soliloquy is of lucidity, or stupidity.  Sounds a lot like what Cornelius thought of Hamlet for five acts.  We all know how that ended.

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The West must not let this crisis spiral out of control
By Vali Nasr

Medford, Massachussetts. - On Nov. 3, Gen. Pervez Musharraf put Pakistan effectively under martial law. He suspended the Constitution; sacked judges; imposed restrictions on the press; and put hundreds of politicians, lawyers, and civil society activists in jail or under house arrest.

This was a military coup, President Musharraf's second in less than a decade. In 1999, his target was the elected government; this time it is the judiciary, the obstacle to his indefinite rule over Pakistan. Musharraf justified his actions by warning that Pakistan's sovereignty was in danger and that he would not allow the country "to commit suicide." One would assume he was referring to foreign invasion or civil war, but it was Pakistan's independent-minded judges and secular lawyers that he was accusing of sedition, for standing up to him and holding his government accountable before the law.

In the weeks leading up to martial law, suicide bombers had killed 140 people in an attack on former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto. Seven more people died a few days later in a blast outside Musharraf's office and another eight in an attack on Air Force personnel. During the same week, Islamic extremists battled thousands of soldiers for control of Swat, a district on the Afghan border. Hundreds were killed as the military endured the humiliation of surrendering 48 soldiers to the extremists. The surging violence is a threat to Pakistan, but as Musharraf's speech made clear, it is democracy – not extremism – that worries him.

Since 9/11, Washington has embraced Musharraf as an ally in the war on terror and the bulwark against extremism in Pakistan. But Musharraf's Pakistan has not lived up to expectations. Pakistan's contribution to fighting Al Qaeda is open to question; the Taliban hiding in Pakistan are terrorizing southern Afghanistan; and in Pakistan, there is now more violence, extremism, and instability than when Musharraf took over in 1999.

What is wrong with this picture?

Washington is more concerned with Islamic extremism than Musharraf, who as military chief in 1999 sent jihadi fighters into Kashmir to challenge Indian troops. He pays lip service to democracy but views the Constitution as an impediment and elections as a threatening menace. Little wonder that while presenting a secular image to the West, Musharraf has looked to Islamic parties to upend democracy and keep former prime ministers Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif out of politics. Musharraf engineered the unexpected electoral success of Islamic parties in the 2002 elections and helped them form governments in two provinces.

As a price for their cooperation, Islamic parties got protection for their Taliban and extremist allies and a free hand to impose more Islamic laws on Pakistanis. Since 2001, Musharraf has selectively cooperated in the war on terror but resisted cutting all ties with extremists.

Extremism is not a clean weapon, and the jihadi Frankenstein that Pakistani intelligence has let loose is now threatening its master. Musharraf has been the target of assassinations, and last summer troops had to be deployed in Islamabad to dislodge violent extremists from the Red Mosque, popular with Pakistani officers and less than a mile away from the headquarters of Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence.

Things turned for the worse last spring when Musharraf tried to end the independence of the judiciary by firing the uncooperative head of the Supreme Court. Thousands of lawyers and secular pro-democracy activists poured into the streets to defend the Constitution. The game was up; fear of extremism was no longer enough to stop the call for democracy.

Hoping to provide a smooth transition to civilian rule, Washington brokered a deal between Musharraf and Bhutto. Before the ink was dry, Musharraf let it be known that he would take off his uniform only after he was reelected. But the Supreme Court frustrated Musharraf's plans, hinting that it would not approve his reelection while he was still head of the military.

It was to prevent the Supreme Court from issuing its damning verdict that Musharraf put Pakistan under martial law. Pakistanis see through Musharraf's ruse and will gather in opposition.

An isolated Musharraf will look to his military to keep him in power. Soldiers fighting Islamic extremists, plus an insurgency in Baluchistan and a war with Al Qaeda and Pashtun tribesmen, will now also face angry throngs in their own streets. This will not benefit the war on terror nor is it a mission the military covets. In the past, Pakistan's military has overthrown governments that have sent soldiers to fight crowds. In 1969, the military removed Gen. Ayub Khan once antigovernment opposition reached a crescendo. His successor, Gen. Yahya Khan, quickly promised – and eventually implemented – free and fair elections and return to civilian rule. Almost a decade later, General Zia ul-Haq overthrew Prime Minister Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto before he could order the Army to suppress anti-government protesters.

Musharraf's interests are no longer those of his military, and the two are now on a collision course. Generals can still end this crisis by going back to the deal Washington brokered with Ms. Bhutto, but only if it does not include Musharraf. Removing Musharraf will send demonstrators home and the Army to its barracks.

The longer Musharraf stays in power the more Pakistan will look like Iran in 1979: an isolated and unpopular ruler hanging on to power only to inflame passions and bring together his Islamic and pro-democracy opposition into a dangerous alliance.

A disastrous outcome in Pakistan, a nuclear-armed state with weak institutions and rife with extremist ideologies, violence, and deep ethnic and social divisions, will be far worse than what followed the Iranian revolution.

The West cannot afford to let this political crisis spiral out of control. Western leaders must keep the pressure on Musharraf, reach out to the Pakistani Army, and seriously plan for a post-Musharraf Pakistan

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Perils of Pakistan

Arnaud de Borchgrave - One of the world's eight nuclear powers, Pakistan is now a failing state out of control where Taliban, al Qaeda and their supporters have secured their privileged sanctuaries in the tribal areas on the Afghan border; reoccupied the Red Mosque in the center of Islamabad; launched suicide bombers in widely scattered parts of this Muslim country of 160 million.

More than any other country, Pakistan is the breeding ground of Islamic terrorism. Yet it enjoys the status of "major non-NATO ally" of the United States. Now 60 years old, Pakistan has lived under military dictatorship for half its life.

In 1999, Gen., Pervez Musharraf, the army chief of staff (the country's supreme military commander), seized power and decreed martial law. Last week, with Pakistan spinning out of control, Gen. Musharraf staged his second coup, decreed a state of emergency (tantamount to martial law), dismissed the Supreme Court, suspended the constitution, arrested some 1,500 politicians, lawyers and human rights activists, closed down all 50 TV channels except the one controlled by the government, imposed self-censorship on the print media and appointed new supreme court judges willing to follow orders.

Twice deposed as prime minister, Benazir Bhutto returned to Pakistan Oct. 18 after eight years of self-imposed exile, in what she thought was a power-sharing deal with Gen. Musharraf. He had agreed to doff his uniform and run for president in a free election. As head of her Pakistan People's Party, Pakistan's most popular, Mrs. Bhutto would run in elections scheduled for January and if her party won a majority, she would become prime minister.

Gen. Musharraf also guaranteed the deletion of a little constitutional impediment — political leaders are barred from serving three times as head of government. Everything began to unravel when two suicide bombers attacked her triumphal homecoming parade, killing 142 and injuring more than 400.

Gen. Musharraf, meanwhile, got himself re-elected president by a majority of members of four provincial assemblies, the federal assembly and the senate — but all opposition parties boycotted the balloting and Gen. Musharraf feared the Supreme Court would not validate his election. His second coup d'etat followed.

Mrs. Bhutto flew back to Dubai, her residence in exile, to reassure her three children who had watched the attack on television. She returned to Karachi as security forces deployed throughout major cities. In a Nov. 3 e-mail to this reporter, Mrs. Bhutto said, "Those who support the Taliban and oppose me continue to have high positions in government. Musharraf doesn't remove them nor has he kept any of the promises he made guaranteed by third parties. Yesterday [before Musharraf's state of emergency], television channels broadcast a meeting in Bajaur [one of the seven tribal agencies that border Afghanistan] by a mullah claiming that he and his group will kill me in Rawalpindi (where she was scheduled to attend a PPP rally, now banned)."

Mrs. Bhutto's e-mail added, "The fact that militants hold open meetings without fear of retaliation proves the Musharraf regime is totally inept, unwilling or colluding in their expansion.

"Our rapprochement talks with Musharraf have foundered in the quicksand of his failing promises. There is no move towards democracy. It's either back to dictatorship [1999] or back to a rigged election [2002]. Or Musharraf is replaced with a pliant interim government for two years run from behind the scene by the same military hard-liners. They claim in two years they can push NATO out of Afghanistan and replace president [Hamid] Karzai with one of their own, betting that the U.S. will be caught up in presidential elections for one year and it will take another year for the new administration to settle in."

By way of conclusion, Mrs. Bhutto's e-mail said, "The situation is grim, the risks are high, but I have faith in the people to turn around the problem if we can get a real election." That horizon seems to be receding.

In recent opinion polls, Gen. Musharraf was in single digits, President Bush in the teens, and Osama bin Laden close to 50 percent. Pakistan's extremist militants reject a woman as the nation's leader, as well as an alliance with America.

Mahmoud Al Hasan, a leader of the extremist Hezb-ul-Mujahideen, the militant wing of the religious Jamaat-e-Islami party, described Mrs. Bhutto and Gen. Musharraf as "slaves" of the United States. Mrs. Bhutto had the added distinction of being labeled an infidel. "What should be the reaction of jihadis?" Mr. Al Hasan asked. "They should definitely kill her. She is an enemy of Islam and jihadis."

There are several hundred, if not thousands, of jihadis willing to commit suicide to assassinate Mrs. Bhutto. This, in turn, could trigger a civil war in a country with an estimated 50 nuclear weapons and delivery systems. The military are convinced Mr. Bush compelled Gen. Musharraf to deploy some 100,000 troops in the tribal agencies on the Afghan border to eradicate Taliban and al Qaeda infrastructure. But their heart was never in it. And Gen. Musharraf himself confirmed U.S. pressure in his memoirs "In the Line of Fire." More than 1,000 Pakistani troops were killed, over 3,000 injured and almost 300 captured. A number chose to stay with the Taliban fighters and the others were released after pledging not to attack their "brothers."

With Taliban and al Qaeda sanctuaries now secure in the foothills of the Hindu Kush, the NATO campaign to whittle down Taliban's guerrilla units in Afghanistan could last for years. But those doing the fighting with U.S. units — Canadian, British and Dutch contingents — were beginning to lose political and public opinion support at home. Logistics were costly, with no end in sight. What they originally thought might be a two- to three-year peacekeeping commitment could now take five to 10 more years. The Afghan army, according to a Canadian assessment, won't be able to manage security till 2015. Even German, French and Italian units, stationed in relatively peaceful zones far from the Afghan border, could feel growing reluctance on their respective home fronts to keep them there. The narco-state stigma also rankled opposition politicians in Berlin, Paris and Rome. But opium is critical to the Afghan economy.

Gen. Sir David Richards, who commanded the Afghan mission until last February, said, "there are too few troops to conduct the operation in a manner that meets the basic rules of a counterinsurgency campaign" and that "we need a doubling of forces — and probably a lot more than that — if we are to achieve minimum goals." That would double the 41,000-strong NATO force to more than 80,000. The future of NATO hangs in the balance.

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UN chief rejects Pak protest, reiterates concern over emergency

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has rejected Pakistan's protest over his statement expressing serious concern at the imposition of emergency rule.

The UN chief also urged the government to release all detainees and restore democratic rule.According to a statement from the mission, Pakistan's Ambassador Munir Akram met Ban on Monday and conveyed his protest on the issuance of a statement by him regarding the internal developments in Pakistan. Asked whether he believed Gen Musharraf's imposition of emergency rule was an internal matter or a matter for possible UN action, Ban told reporters ''I stand by my statement which I issued.'' The Secretary General said he met Akram at his request ''and I again expressed my deep concern and regret at what had happened in Pakistan.''''I also urged strongly that Pakistani government should return to democratic rules and procedures as soon as possible, and also urged the Pakistani leadership to release immediately all the detained political leaders, and lawyers and also special rapporteur (UN's expert) on freedom of religion and faith,'' he said.

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Musharraf fears democracy, not extremism

Washington is more concerned with Islamic extremism than Musharraf, who as military chief in 1999 sent jihadi fighters into Kashmir to challenge Indian troops. He pays lip service to democracy but views the Constitution as an impediment and elections as a threatening menace. Little wonder that while presenting a secular image to the West, Musharraf has looked to Islamic parties to upend democracy and keep former prime ministers Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif out of politics. Musharraf engineered the unexpected electoral success of Islamic parties in the 2002 elections and helped them form governments in two provinces.

As a price for their cooperation, Islamic parties got protection for their Taliban and extremist allies and a free hand to impose more Islamic laws on Pakistanis. Since 2001, Musharraf has selectively cooperated in the war on terror but resisted cutting all ties with extremists.

Extremism is not a clean weapon, and the jihadi Frankenstein that Pakistani intelligence has let loose is now threatening its master. Musharraf has been the target of assassinations, and last summer troops had to be deployed in Islamabad to dislodge violent extremists from the Red Mosque, popular with Pakistani officers and less than a mile away from the headquarters of Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence.

Things turned for the worse last spring when Musharraf tried to end the independence of the judiciary by firing the uncooperative head of the Supreme Court. Thousands of lawyers and secular pro-democracy activists poured into the streets to defend the Constitution. The game was up; fear of extremism was no longer enough to stop the call for democracy.

Hoping to provide a smooth transition to civilian rule, Washington brokered a deal between Musharraf and Bhutto. Before the ink was dry, Musharraf let it be known that he would take off his uniform only after he was reelected. But the Supreme Court frustrated Musharraf's plans, hinting that it would not approve his reelection while he was still head of the military.

It was to prevent the Supreme Court from issuing its damning verdict that Musharraf put Pakistan under martial law. Pakistanis see through Musharraf's ruse and will gather in opposition.

An isolated Musharraf will look to his military to keep him in power. Soldiers fighting Islamic extremists, plus an insurgency in Baluchistan and a war with Al Qaeda and Pashtun tribesmen, will now also face angry throngs in their own streets. This will not benefit the war on terror nor is it a mission the military covets. In the past, Pakistan's military has overthrown governments that have sent soldiers to fight crowds. In 1969, the military removed Gen. Ayub Khan once antigovernment opposition reached a crescendo. His successor, Gen. Yahya Khan, quickly promised - and eventually implemented - free and fair elections and return to civilian rule. Almost a decade later, General Zia ul-Haq overthrew Prime Minister Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto before he could order the Army to suppress anti-government protesters.

Musharraf's interests are no longer those of his military, and the two are now on a collision course. Generals can still end this crisis by going back to the deal Washington brokered with Ms. Bhutto, but only if it does not include Musharraf. Removing Musharraf will send demonstrators home and the Army to its barracks.

The longer Musharraf stays in power the more Pakistan will look like Iran in 1979: an isolated and unpopular ruler hanging on to power only to inflame passions and bring together his Islamic and pro-democracy opposition into a dangerous alliance.

A disastrous outcome in Pakistan, a nuclear-armed state with weak institutions and rife with extremist ideologies, violence, and deep ethnic and social divisions, will be far worse than what followed the Iranian revolution.
The West cannot afford to let this political crisis spiral out of control. Western leaders must keep the pressure on Musharraf, reach out to the Pakistani Army, and seriously plan for a post-Musharraf Pakistan.

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Bhutto Accuses Musharraf of Staging `Second Coup' in Pakistan 
By Ed Johnson and Khalid Qayum

Nov. 5 (Bloomberg) -- Former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto accused President Pervez Musharraf of staging a ``second coup'' in Pakistan by imposing emergency rule and said judges, lawyers and opposition parties will protest the move today. 

``The judges are not going to take this lying down,'' Bhutto said in an interview yesterday with CBS News. ``It's going to lead to an unnecessary confrontation between the regime and the people, which only can help the extremists.'' 

Lawyers plan a nationwide boycott of court proceedings today to demonstrate against martial law and the government's ``attack on the judiciary,'' said Hamid Khan, a member of the Supreme Court Bar Association. 

Musharraf, 64, suspended the constitution on Nov. 3 for the second time since he took power in a 1999 military coup. His government sacked the country's top judge, ordered the arrest of hundreds of opposition supporters and activists and said elections due by Jan. 15 may be delayed for a year. 

Bhutto, who returned to Pakistan last month after eight years in self-imposed exile, called on the international community to press Musharraf to ``restore the constitution, to release the political prisoners, respect the judiciary and hold elections under an independent election commission.'' 

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said yesterday the U.S. will review its foreign aid to Pakistan and said Musharraf must ``exercise restraint.'' 

Army Chief 

The declaration of emergency rule came as the Supreme Court was nearing a decision on the legality of Musharraf's Oct. 6 re- election as president while also serving as army chief. 

Musharraf said he was acting against ``judicial interference'' in government affairs and terrorism and extremism that ``has peaked throughout the country.'' 

Musharraf issued a law barring newspapers, news agencies and broadcasters from publishing photographs of suicide bombers, terrorists, or victims' bodies and statements from militants. 

The law also bans publication of any material ``that defames, brings into ridicule or disrepute the head of state or members of the armed forces or executive, legislative organs.'' 

Offenders can be jailed for three years. 

Privately run television news channels went off air across the country on Nov. 3. The government is negotiating with broadcasters to resume transmission, Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz told reporters yesterday in Islamabad, the official Associated Press of Pakistan reported. 

Musharraf appointed Abdul Hameed Dogar, a Supreme Court judge, to replace Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry. Several other judges swore an oath under the emergency proclamation. 

Courts were barred from questioning the emergency rule order or making any judgment against the president and his government. 

Musharraf last suspended the constitution for three years after ousting the elected government of former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, ending 11 years of civilian rule. 

``It is difficult to say how long the emergency will remain,'' Aziz said yesterday. ``It will remain as long as it is required.'' 

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Pakistan police say bombers plan Bhutto rally attack
Scotsman - United Kingdom
November 9, 2007

SUICIDE bombers are planning to attack Benazir Bhutto's protest rally tomorrow against Pakistan's emergency rule, the pro-government police claimed today. ...

SUICIDE bombers are planning to attack Benazir Bhutto's protest rally tomorrow against Pakistan's emergency rule, the pro-government police claimed today. 

Hundreds of members of her Pakistan People's Party were reportedly arrested this morning, after Ms Bhutto urged them to give a huge show of strength in Rawalpindi. 

And just hours later, the city's police chief warned of a possible massacre tomorrow. 

"We have intelligence reports that suicide bombers have entered Rawalpindi," said Saud Aziz. He added that the warning was based on specific information and "the situation is very serious". 

Ms Bhutto's homecoming procession last month following eight years in exile was shattered by suicide bombers who killed more than 145 people. Islamic militants are suspected. 
She has refused to call off the rally and repeatedly said she is willing to risk more bombings.

This article: http://news.scotsman.com/international.cfm?id=1776472007
 

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Senator Obama condemns the decision by President Musharraf to invoke a state of emergency

November 05, 2007 -- Chicago, IL -- Obama for America today released to the following statement on the state of emergency declared by President Pervez Musharraf in Pakistan this weekend.

"Senator Obama condemns the decision by President Musharraf to invoke a state of emergency. President Musharraf has broken his pledge to his own people and to the world to move toward democracy. Pakistan is a critical ally of the United States against terrorism, a nuclear weapons state, and an important nation in South Asia and within the broader Muslim world. It is in the interests of the Pakistani people and the United States to see our ally move toward democracy, as more authoritarian government will only mean more instability, more discontent, and more extremism in Pakistan.

"The United States must be clear and unequivocal: President Musharraf should reverse this declaration, respect the decision of the Supreme Court, and hold free and fair elections for parliament in January. At the same time, the United States must move beyond the Administration's failed policies of promoting stability over democracy, which has undercut our efforts to root out terrorists in Pakistan. We must start with a serious review of our investments in Pakistan to make sure that U.S. assistance is supporting democracy, not repression; and to ensure that concrete action is being taken against terrorism in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas, so that al Qaeda terrorists who threaten America do not continue to have a safe-haven," said Obama spokesman Bill Burton.

Source: Barack Obama campaign

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Mohtarma Bhutto says struggle for restoration of Constitution will continue

Islamabad November 9, 2007: Former Prime Minister and Chairperson of the Pakistan Peoples Party Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto has warned that the fate of Iraq could befall Pakistan if democracy was not restored in the country and the dictatorship persisted in stifling the people's voice and aspirations.

She was addressing the media persons on the main road outside her house in Islamabad where security personnel blocked the roads to prevent her from going to the venue of PPP public meeting scheduled to be held in the Liaquat Bagh in Rawalindi today.

She said that the arrest of more than five thousand Party workers, the detention of Party MPs, the baton charge in different parts of the country and roadblocks set up had showed that the regime was paralyzed.

She said that the struggle for restoration of the Constitution will continue and the barricades erected in the path of the people will be swept aside with the power of the people.

Mohtarma Bhutto said that as a result of dictatorship in Iraq and the stifling of the people's voice the masses rose in revolt and the conditions so deteriorated that today Iraq was being threatened to split in three. She said that if Pakistan was to be saved from the fate of Iraq it was critical that democracy was restored in the country.

She said that she was aware of the threat to her personal security but the threat to the future of the country was even greater and that was why she had come out in the open to fight for the peoples' democratic rights.

She said that Pakistan was under grave threat as there was no writ of the state in some tribal agencies and now also in parts of Frontier Province. "Te flag of Pakistan has been lowered in Kalam, Madyan and other areas of Frontier' she said, adding "we cannot sit back and watch silently the disintegration of the state".

She said that she had negotiated with Musharaf for the restoration of democracy but by imposing martial law and suspending the Constitution General Musharraf had reneged on his promises and there were no talks with the regime.

She said there was no need to talk with the regime until the constitution was restored, the uniformed presidency was ended and an election schedule is announced in accordance with the Constitution.

She said that the present struggle was not her struggle alone but it was the fight for the people of Pakistan and urged the people to come out into the open and support the ongoing struggle.

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Bush urges Musharraf to release detainees :White House

WASHINGTON  ( 2007-11-05 19:44:24 ) : 

US President George W. Bush is urging President Pervez Musharraf to quickly return to civilian rule and release people detained under an emergency decree, the White House said on Monday.

White House spokeswoman Dana Perino told reporters that the US government was "deeply disturbed" by Musharraf's imposition of emergency rule on Saturday.

Bush was expected to make his first public comments on the Pakistan situation after holding White House talks with Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan starting at 1:15 p.m. EST (1815 GMT), White House officials said.

Musharraf's action dealt a sharp blow to the Bush administration, which had appealed to him not to declare emergency rule.

"We cannot support emergency rule or the extreme measures taken during the emergency," Perino said. "Such actions are not in Pakistan's best interest and damage the progress Pakistan has made on its path to democracy."

"The president and his advisers right now are urging him to quickly return to civilian rule, to get back on the path of democracy, to restore the freedoms of the press as well as release detainees," she said. "The president continues to urge calm on all of the parties."   

Musharraf pledges elections 'as close as possible to schedule'

 ISLAMABAD  ( 2007-11-05 20:38:39 ) : 

President Pervez Musharraf has promised that elections due in January will be held 'as close as possible to the schedule' despite a state of emergency, his spokesman said on Monday.

"Efforts are to stay as close as possible to the schedule of elections. There are legal implications," presidential spokesman Rashid Qureshi quoted Musharraf as telling foreign ambassadors.

Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz said earlier that the elections would be held "according to the schedule", amid international calls for the Pakistani government not to postpone the polls.

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